tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-61292084536552067422024-02-18T22:06:47.464-08:00The Beau ZoneHey, dudes & babes! Beau Hajavitch here. You've found THE BEAU ZONE! Here you'll find my controversial opinions on anything. Formerly part of my Hard Rock Heroes website, it's now, along w/the entire Beau Zone archive, on Blogspot. Frustrated? That my opinions aren't usually reflected in media? Here's my outlet - The Beau Zone. You may laugh, cry, or get thoroughly disgusted. Guess what? Not a damn thing you can do about it! HA HA HA! Light up a smoke, & here we go:Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.comBlogger113125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-47377338975302274242023-05-08T12:31:00.000-07:002023-05-08T12:31:26.318-07:00Dancing With Danger: The Ultimate Streetheart Set List<p>So what do you guys think of this? I’ve never heard Streetheart exactly the way I’d love to, so I spent a couple of days putting this together. This is kind of like fan fiction, though, once you get to the encore, because it imagines an arena concert when Kenny Shields was still with us, in, I guess, the post-1983 time period sometime. Who would like to see this? </p><p>THE ULTIMATE STREETHEART SET LIST </p><div style="text-align: left;">Without Your Love<br />Drugstore Dancer <br />Action<br />Tin Soldier<br />Teenage Rage<br />Nobody Like You<br />Trouble<br />Underground<br />Angela<br />What Kind Of Love Is This<br />Look In Your Eyes<br />Hollywood<br />Comin’ True<br />Snow White </div><p>Encore: </p><div style="text-align: left;">Highway Isolation (Whole band on stage except Kenny but spotlight only on Spider. At end, goes right into.....)<br />Have It Your Way (Spotlight turns off of Spider, darkness for a few seconds, turns back on, on Kenny, way up there on the Streetheart logo coming down.)<br />Can You Feel It<br />Under My Thumb </div><p>Missing from the set are Miss Plaza Suite and One More Time because, I’m sorry, I think both those songs are so boring. </p><div><br /></div>Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-26395193589271604462022-11-28T13:06:00.000-08:002022-11-28T13:06:05.467-08:00A Yabba-Dabba-Doozie Of A Story: Pebbles & Bamm-Bamm Broadcast Scheduling, Canadian Cable, And CBS Affiliate Delaying TacticsI'm going to do something in this post that I do all the time on social media, but not much here in The Beau Zone: Reminiscing about the 1970s. Specifically, reminiscing about Saturday morning cartoons, Sunday morning cartoons, Winnipeg starting to receive U.S. network affiliates via cable, and the Flintstones spinoffs Pebbles & Bamm-Bamm, where those two kids are teenagers, and the following year's Flintstone Comedy Hour.<div><br /></div><div>And even more specifically, this will describe how I never got to see the opening theme song to Pebbles & Bamm-Bamm until a Saturday AFTERNOON in the mid-'70s.</div><div><br /></div><div>Okay, here we go:</div><div><br /></div><div>So I had known about the Pebbles & Bamm-Bamm show on CBS on Saturday mornings during the 1971-1972 TV season. I knew the shows that were on through those two-page ads the networks used to take out in the middle of comic books. But I couldn't see them. I'm in Canada. We didn't get CBS, NBC, or ABC in Canada.</div><div><br /></div><div>(Well, we sort of got ABC shows. We could get a station out of Pembina, North Dakota, right across the border, called KCND, using rabbit ears antennas we placed on our TV set. KCND was mostly an independent station that sold ads in the Winnipeg market. But they did accept some limited ABC programming. On Saturday mornings, they broadcast whatever shows ABC aired at 8:00 a.m. and 9:30 a.m. CST and on Sunday mornings, they aired Make A Wish at 10:30 a.m., and they delayed the shows ABC aired Saturdays at 7:00 a.m. and 7:30 a.m. and aired one of those Sundays at 11:00 a.m. and one at 4:30 p.m. The purpose of the 4:30 p.m. one was because KCND aired two movies before that, and if the movies ran overtime, they could join the cartoon show in progress. This must have been before broadcasters teamed with movie producers to somehow make movies and commercials fit into prescribed time slots. Now, all of this has NOTHING to do with the subject at hand - until we get into a CBS affiliate delaying cartoons later on in this - so that's why I've put it in brackets. Just to show that we did get a few ABC network cartoons through KCND before the fall of 1972.) </div><div><br /></div><div>Then came the fall of 1972, when I assume Winnipeg was given access to North Dakota affiliates to CBS, NBC, and ABC, that we could now get on cable. At least that's when our apartment block started getting cable. It was mid-September, so we missed just two or three weeks of the new Saturday morning cartoon schedule.</div><div><br /></div><div>During the 1972 season, CBS aired The Flintstone Comedy Hour at 10:00 a.m. The first half-hour was new short Flintstones cartoons and Bedrock Rockers (Pebbles & Bamm-Bamm's band) music videos. The second half-hour was a half-hour long Pebbles & Bamm-Bamm cartoon, which I figured was the previous season's Pebbles & Bamm-Bamm show incorporated into the Flintstone Comedy Hour. Pebbles' voice was different in these cartoons - hey, it was the voice of Sally Struthers from All In The Family! (she had to quit being Pebbles' voice after she got All In The Family) - and the animation was better, closer to the animation of the last couple of years of the original Flintstones series.</div><div><br /></div><div>During this season, CBC in Canada even replaced their long-running Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Hour at 5:00 p.m. with the Flintstone Comedy Hour for a while. </div><div><br /></div><div>The following year, in September 1973, The Flintstone Comedy Hour became the Flintstone Comedy Show, as it became the first half-hour of the show only, in reruns, as the second half, the Pebbles & Bamm-Bamm Show cartoons, had been retired. It was common on all networks that if a show ran for a second season, which would be reruns, it would be retired after that. </div><div><br /></div><div>So that year ran its' course, and beginning in September 1974, that whole spin-off conglomerate was forgotten.</div><div><br /></div><div>But wait.....much later on, it came back!</div><div><br /></div><div>Okay, now, first we have to discuss CBS and their Sunday morning cartoon lineup to give you some background here.</div><div><br /></div><div>CBS and ABC in those days used to have short Sunday morning cartoon lineups in addition to their all-morning Saturday cartoon lineup. In CBS' case, they only aired two shows at 8:00 a.m. CST for one hour. In Winnipeg. though, we never had that. Our CBS affiliate, KXJB in Valley City, ND, at first didn't air the CBS Sunday morning cartoon lineup in favor of religious programming (something many affiliates did). But later on, in the mid-'70s, they did start to delay that one hour of cartoon shows to the following Saturday at 1:00 p.m., after CBS' Saturday cartoon lineup, including the CBS Children's Film Festival at 12 noon, was over. "Delaying" is TV lingo meaning the exact same thing as when you set your VCR or PVR to record a show and you watch it later with the commercials intact. All of CBS' commercials stayed intact. It sure blew my mind away as a kid, to have gone through a whole week of school and winter weather, then to watch on TV shows and their commercials that originally aired on CBS the previous Sunday, BEFORE that entire work week occurred! As well as the entire morning of Saturday cartoon shows that just finished. </div><div><br /></div><div>At one point, the two shows were My Favorite Martians at 1:00 p.m. and Bailey's Comets at 1:30 p.m. This still has been the only time in my life I have ever seen these shows. But then, Bailey's Comets was taken away and replaced by.....Pebbles & Bamm-Bamm!</div><div><br /></div><div>And I finally, after all these years, got to see the opening credits to the Pebbles & Bamm-Bamm show! What year was this? 1976? On a Saturday afternoon at 1:30 p.m.!</div><div><br /></div><div>If any decision-makers at KXJB in the mid-'70s are reading this, if they're not already dead, thank you very much for deciding to air that CBS Sunday morning cartoon lineup, even if it was delayed by six days!</div><div><br /></div><div>And there's a perspective on cartoon shows you could only read from a Canadian living close to the border with our unique access to American channels and networks.</div><div><br /></div><div>And yes, I do now have the entire Pebbles & Bamm-Bamm series on DVD and can watch the opening credits and the episodes any time I please. But when will the Flintstone Comedy Hour (or actually, Flintstone Comedy Show) come out on DVD?
</div>Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-59091807795828162372020-02-26T12:08:00.000-08:002020-07-22T11:04:48.043-07:00Ballroom Blitz? Boxing Day Blitz? No, More Like Blocking Blitz: DJ Blitz Is Blocking Everyone!(Note: This new paragraph in brackets was written in July 2020. Guess what? DJ Blitz has unblocked me on Twitter. But it could only be because I replied to someone on Twitter who replied to one of his tweets, and that guy replied back. So Blitz could see his side of the conversation but not mine. I still don't know if Blitz even knows of this blog entry. I didn't tell anyone about it after I posted it. I didn't talk about it on Twitter or Facebook or anywhere. I was curious to see how long it took before someone discovered it. Anyway, Blitz is not yet unblocking me on Facebook, only Twitter. And if I did a version of this paragraph to him, telling him I will continue to keep this blog entry up until he also unblocks me on Facebook, he might say, "What blog entry?" and ultimately I have dug myself in deeper. So instead, I'm not going to look a gift horse in the mouth and I'm not going to say a word to Blitz, instead I'm just doing this new paragraph to tell him and everybody here that the blog entry stays until he unblocks me on Facebook too, and that's the end of that. He probably, after unblocking me on Twitter, read the conversation me and that guy were doing, the time passed, and he just forgot to block me again. Who knows? And what is my perspective to responding to his tweets? Will that draw attention to me, causing him to block me again? It's too early to say, because with COVID, Blitz hasn't been tweeting much lately, and the tweets he has done I haven't wanted to respond to. But you'll know if he reblocks me when I remove this paragraph.)<br />
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As a former DIY-type media host myself, as the host and producer of my own TV show on cable access TV here in Winnipeg called Hard Rock Heroes, I've always admired someone like DJ Blitz. Here's a guy who has created such a buzz for himself as a DJ through social media that he has parlayed himself into being a bonafide Winnipeg celebrity, one who attracts massive crowds whenever he does special DJ dates at Cowboys and other places he is not a DJ regular at, and one who can now even become a weekend announcer at Virgin Radio. (I wonder how Twitter and Facebook would have affected Hard Rock Heroes if the internet had been around back then. My show aired just before the dawn of the internet, from 1990 to 1993.) <br />
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So I followed him on Twitter and Facebook. It's cool that, since for various reasons I can no longer be the toast of the town with my show or any kind of replacement, I can now at least live vicariously through Blitz' media circus. He followed me back on Twitter, and liked many of my joking and/or smartass comments, and replies to his comments. Everything was good, until.....<br />
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One afternoon, he blocked me on Twitter. And I'm certainly not the only one.<br />
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Over the course of the next several months to a year, here are my attempts to get to the bottom of this: I tried contacting him all of the different ways you could at that time to ask him why, or if it was a mistake. He had his phone number on his Facebook page at that time. I called him and he answered and he blurted out he thought it was a mistake, but that he had to go and he hung up. He then proceeded to NOT unblock me. Every time I tried calling him after that - once every week or two - it would go to voice mail at first, so I'd leave messages that Blitz never responded to, then the voice mail would be filled up for many weeks, then finally I got a generic message that said the person at this number was unavailable and to leave a message. I did that only once, because at that point Blitz could have gotten rid of that number and it could have belonged to someone else by that point. Meanwhile, I would be sending him Facebook messages and Facebook would tell me that they were read, but Blitz ignored those as well. All my voice mail and Facebook messages, as well as emails I sent him, too, were all polite and gave him the benefit of the doubt and treated the situation like he had just been too busy to unblock me if, as he told me, it was a mistake, and so my messages would act as just friendly reminders.<br />
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I also thanked him for not blocking me on Facebook, and so a small part of me thought maybe what I just wrote was true, because if Blitz had something against me, he would have blocked me on Facebook, too, as I had been making comments on his posts there. But then, the day came: He posted a video of him and some girl lip-syncing the song Promiscuous by Nelly Furtado and Timberland, and I did a comment praising him for that video and how great it was, and how I would have loved to do stuff like that to promote my show back in the day, but that was before the internet, so at least now I can live vicariously through him. And after I posted that reply, he blocked me on Facebook. I can still see his page, but only if I punch it up. I cannot follow him, which means his posts won't show up in my timeline, and I cannot like his posts or comment on them or message him. I can only share his posts. And I did share his Promiscuous post, if you look at my Facebook page.<br />
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Is this the way someone who aspires to be a top on-air personality at a Winnipeg radio station conducts himself? By showing though his behavior that he isn't brave enough to talk to me on the phone or send me a computer message that tells me as a common courtesy WHY he is doing this? If he's going to have a career dealing with the public, then he needs to be man enough to be able to tell any member of the public what he needs to tell them. <br />
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Now, as I said before, I am not the only one he is doing this to. I recall Blitz tweeting a screenshot without an accompanying comment that showed he was blocking over 4000 people on Twitter. On another day, he told someone on Twitter he couldn't remember the last time he had blocked someone. Then, on another day, he told someone he had to block a few people. Ummm, make up your mind, dude.<br />
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Do a search on Twitter on the following: DJ Blitz blocked (not as a phrase), and look at all the tweets from people who have discovered DJ Blitz has blocked them and have no idea why! I did that and below this blog are six screen grabs of a few of those many victims. Later on, after I had captured and cropped those screen grabs in preparation for this blog, I noticed he is also blocking writer Shelley Cook and comedian Jules Rowan, and they have no idea why, either.<br />
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I suspect that with all the stuff Blitz does involving high school students and the very young adults that hang out at Cowboys, that he only wants to deal with people of that age group. Ages 15 to, say, 20 or a bit older. People older than that are thought by the people in that age group to be "creepy." Maybe DJ Blitz thinks they're creepy, too. So he curates his followers by ruthlessly blocking everyone who is not in that age group. Well, if that is his mindset, as I suggested above, he's got a lot to learn as he gets older himself and moves up in the broadcasting world. Wouldn't it be rad if he has to interview someone live on air on Virgin one day, and in the conversation, that person randomly asks, "So, Blitz, how come you're blocking me?" Maybe he'll cowardly cut them off and move on to something else, the same way he got rid of me on the phone. And if the guest is live in the studio, well, then.....<br />
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If I am wrong in my theory about age groups, then why would he want to alienate all those people by blocking them on Twitter and being so disingenuous and vague on that subject? Why is he basically ghosting all those people and myself on the subject of why he is blocking them on Twitter and/or Facebook? Why is he pissing everybody off?<br />
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Wouldn't it be nice if things just got back to normal here, with him unblocking me and everyone else on Twitter and Facebook, and letting all of us be a fan of his? That's my only goal here. Positive feelings all around. No negative feelings. <br />
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Besides, doesn't he realize that blocking someone means that that person can still tag him in a tweet - if it's me tweeting, I just have to type out his whole handle, it won't auto-fill - and that it could turn out to be something earth-shattering he would want to see (whether it's positive or negative), but he can't because he's blocking me! Everyone else in the world can see that tweet except for him! And no one else reading that tweet would even know he's blocking me! Maybe they'll respond to both me and him. He'll see that response, but he'll wonder what they're talking about because he can't see the original tweet because it's by me, someone who he's blocking! This is why I don't block anyone: I don't want anyone tagging me in a tweet I can't see because I'm blocking them!<br />
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You can still view a person's Twitter page with their original tweets when you're being blocked by not logging in. You need to login to view their "Tweets & Replies," though, meaning any tweet that starts off by tagging someone, which Twitter considers a "reply." I can still see the "Tweets & Replies" of Blitz and anyone else who is blocking me with a couple of secret accounts I have that don't have my name on them. I choose not to reply on those accounts. but I may reply to anyone who is replying to Blitz after I login to my real account, making me a part of the conversation. That Blitz can't see! That'll fix his wagon. <br />
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So if this blog can accomplish something and give Blitz a change of heart and makes him see the error of his ways and the bigger picture here, inducing him to unblock everyone, then I'll remove it. If not, I guess this will have to stand as a testament that some people just ain't what they seem. Don't judge a book by its' cover, people. Be careful who you choose to be your heroes. And always keep your eyes open for a con job from a con man. Hopefully, in the years to come, as he gets older and more into the general public mainstream, Blitz's actions will come back to haunt him and he will answer for his actions. Not from me, but from all those other people he has harmed along the way by blocking them. As Justin Timberlake sang, "What goes around comes all the way back around." Take heed, Blitz. Be the bigger man. Be an adult.<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc3QsmVWZQb0iKamVnEn0kx2J32mmCZNr9d_7K-9WJxpV5uxrpThZOfzOcrCVldYEQ5_gniASTcKbV1RLvVsKDBF3jsbC-DFbjmJMDMuOm73voTv1xaEv0SV8ah-WPqNbt-SBZ2B9S5LCQ/s1600/djblitzblock1.jpg" imageanchor="1" ><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc3QsmVWZQb0iKamVnEn0kx2J32mmCZNr9d_7K-9WJxpV5uxrpThZOfzOcrCVldYEQ5_gniASTcKbV1RLvVsKDBF3jsbC-DFbjmJMDMuOm73voTv1xaEv0SV8ah-WPqNbt-SBZ2B9S5LCQ/s320/djblitzblock1.jpg" width="247" height="320" data-original-width="562" data-original-height="729" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmINpR7o-GDDZNM_wkjalSHXaEC5TwhYJM_LtSWe7aAkvJwTKK5iEt2c0b0tFt6I5dA5QVxZH-w_orLS3QOsO2MfA07S9XmM4LciPFN40GZhtmVBdsVQmgU5He_0FuQ25vPysNQ8MLlwUm/s1600/djblitzblock2.jpg" imageanchor="1" ><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmINpR7o-GDDZNM_wkjalSHXaEC5TwhYJM_LtSWe7aAkvJwTKK5iEt2c0b0tFt6I5dA5QVxZH-w_orLS3QOsO2MfA07S9XmM4LciPFN40GZhtmVBdsVQmgU5He_0FuQ25vPysNQ8MLlwUm/s320/djblitzblock2.jpg" width="302" height="320" data-original-width="596" data-original-height="631" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghUsUL3jvg8G4rMwezCGg5uV-UOY1hLBAqZGXvqTQ8Qtwe63XMtCZAcW8E8SoNaMh8wfA6f7NokLC_ocqSn_4bTnP15w_Uu48aUqxvUhrXxshm3JnQOfqfGLgWw5V2Zm0tTgttf5emchyphenhyphen-/s1600/djblitzblock3.jpg" imageanchor="1" ><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghUsUL3jvg8G4rMwezCGg5uV-UOY1hLBAqZGXvqTQ8Qtwe63XMtCZAcW8E8SoNaMh8wfA6f7NokLC_ocqSn_4bTnP15w_Uu48aUqxvUhrXxshm3JnQOfqfGLgWw5V2Zm0tTgttf5emchyphenhyphen-/s320/djblitzblock3.jpg" width="274" height="320" data-original-width="580" data-original-height="678" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjI9-oHscdDfqpbvzDXfwmSkIpr-EvQCf_GUZYFmQbyzPfTCDNgVEC-fdS94WJyPGX45AcC0c-PJ5wNGiUOjo7DeSRC_XAfvC2jUZds9Um_6JaPUplaYiO_0c8-zRv2ZUwW7jzQ-IDaEAXe/s1600/djblitzblock4.jpg" imageanchor="1" ><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjI9-oHscdDfqpbvzDXfwmSkIpr-EvQCf_GUZYFmQbyzPfTCDNgVEC-fdS94WJyPGX45AcC0c-PJ5wNGiUOjo7DeSRC_XAfvC2jUZds9Um_6JaPUplaYiO_0c8-zRv2ZUwW7jzQ-IDaEAXe/s320/djblitzblock4.jpg" width="282" height="320" data-original-width="585" data-original-height="665" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2HRnCv0ceJDiOd5ln1_QhJvae179RCv4INIX1mqdLdgb1o3mgTasZM6wvf57bzs-j55Wd047swcPxRrO9xr64A25EEOakave3jWPmwLZ53CKTPyHy4nJrGgL6BWw6WUiylPHeFoU9mu3I/s1600/djblitzblock5.jpg" imageanchor="1" ><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2HRnCv0ceJDiOd5ln1_QhJvae179RCv4INIX1mqdLdgb1o3mgTasZM6wvf57bzs-j55Wd047swcPxRrO9xr64A25EEOakave3jWPmwLZ53CKTPyHy4nJrGgL6BWw6WUiylPHeFoU9mu3I/s320/djblitzblock5.jpg" width="300" height="320" data-original-width="589" data-original-height="628" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9e0-IQ7umrVdAjLLEjbad4GOw_I_tmFr5B8l7_Y77ermizvT5L1x-CiiO5X20t4ncj6F1ThkS665OSNbt4d67TR2Wg9D-CexKXG9Fc-wIqAlvO40l7W2yb-eI8oyhzAgCBjuR5jF1CoH8/s1600/djblitzblock6.jpg" imageanchor="1" ><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9e0-IQ7umrVdAjLLEjbad4GOw_I_tmFr5B8l7_Y77ermizvT5L1x-CiiO5X20t4ncj6F1ThkS665OSNbt4d67TR2Wg9D-CexKXG9Fc-wIqAlvO40l7W2yb-eI8oyhzAgCBjuR5jF1CoH8/s320/djblitzblock6.jpg" width="259" height="320" data-original-width="593" data-original-height="734" /></a>Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-57839714870792341722018-05-03T10:19:00.000-07:002018-05-03T10:19:43.539-07:00Winnipeg's Media Personalities: Shiny Happy People.....Well, Except For Jen ZorattiWhy, Jen, Why?<br />
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I try to be a happy person and to do positive, fun, and positive-snarky tweets on Twitter. The only negative tweets I do are to some organization or policy that I feel has wronged my way of life in some form.<br />
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But a certain media person has made it extremely difficult to keep a smile on my face lately.<br />
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Since Twitter began, the biggest thing I have learned about posting on Twitter is it amplifies people's personalities to such a degree that the differences between people become more stark and palpable. <br />
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I enjoy following media people and sending them snappy/funny/snarky comments about the things they've written or said on TV or radio. Sometimes I give them a perspective they have forgotten about. Sometimes I add a joke to what they've said.<br />
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What do my comments get me? They get me likes and even follows from the happy, positive, upbeat personalities at places like CTV Morning Live and Energy 106. It's such a joy to watch and listen to those people.<br />
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And at the other end of the spectrum.......there is Winnipeg Free Press reporter Jen Zoratti.<br />
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The same types of comments I send everybody else have apparently caused Jen to block me on Twitter. I discovered this one day by accident. So I emailed her to ask why she was blocking me. Was it a specific tweet I wrote, and, if so, how did she see it? She wasn't following me, so my tweets wouldn't have been in her timeline. Did someone she was following like or retweet one of my tweets, or was she searching for a hashtag? You would think someone would show the proper common courtesy to answer the question of "why" when that person comes a'calling. But instead, Jen's reply to me asking her why she was blocking me on Twitter was, "Yes, I am blocking you on Twitter. No, it is not a mistake. Please stop contacting me."<br />
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What a stark contrast between this apparently sour, unpleasant person as compared to the wonderful, happy media personalities I mention above. But I follow media personalities who interest me, and Jen's Free Press stories interest me. I could speculate here on things I think she might take exception to on my Twitter feed as opposed to Winnipeg's other media personalities, but that would be useless because I would be assuming things about her that may not be true.<br />
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And that's it, re: her response. No indication of why. I DID contact her again to remind her she didn't tell me why, and she did not respond. I then contacted Winnipeg Free Press editor Paul Samyn, and he told me he would talk to Jen, but that he wouldn't force her to unblock anybody. I told him I wasn't necessarily looking to be unblocked, but to find out why Jen was blocking me. After a few weeks, I emailed him back to say, "How's this coming along?" No response. I emailed him again. No response. I sent the thread to Free Press co-owner Bob Cox. No response. I sent it again a few weeks later. No response.<br />
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Then I said to all three of them that I would do a Facebook post whenever I got around to it, with a meme of Jen that said something she would not like. Why would I do something like that? To make the crime fit the punishment. In other words, I would now be giving Jen a reason to block me on Twitter. We could have now said that she is blocking me on Twitter because I did that meme of her.<br />
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Alas, Facebook removed the post because it violated their terms of service. That post is essentially what you are reading now, with a few changes. But keep reading.<br />
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Then I received a letter from the Winnipeg Free Press' legal counsel informing me they had reported my post to Facebook. So that's how Facebook found it. Even if they didn't remove it, the lawyers demanded that I do it.<br />
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The issue isn't what you are reading now. It's what I had said in the meme.<br />
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After I replied to the lawyer who sent me the letter and she responded, I believe I have taken out any parts of what you are reading now that would constitute harassment or defamation. Oh, but I am leaving in the facts, and I am posting this here on The Beau Zone, as my original idea had been to repost the original Facebook post here before I discovered the lawyer's letter to me via email. So what's left, after deleting any illegal harassment or defamation sections from my post, are simply freedom of speech issues, which are not illegal.<br />
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I want everyone to know what kind of person Jen Zoratti apparently is!<br />
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And these are the facts. So YOU decide what kind of person she is based on these facts.<br />
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Jen is under no obligation to tell me why she blocked me on Twitter, of course, but, now, regarding that, let's get back to my email exchange with these people from seven paragraphs ago. So then Paul Samyn finally breaks his silence and says, "My previous note to you on this matter made clear that Jen is under no obligation to respond to your demands." No, Paul, you NEVER said that to me. I do apologize for not thinking of the phrase "common courtesy" that I used earlier in this Beau Zone post when describing to you my problem, though. No, she is not under any obligation, but c'mon - if you asked me what 2 plus 2 equals, I am not obligated to answer that question, either, but it's a simple question and answer, so most people would just answer the question if asked it. People don't randomly block other people on Twitter for no reason. She HAD to have a reason to block me. And Jen and Paul don't seem to understand that the way to make me GO AWAY is to simply answer the question! WHY did Jen block me on Twitter? Just tell me, and I will delete this post and go away.<br />
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To everyone reading this: do a search of both @JenZoratti and @beauhajavitch on Twitter. Do you see anything there that would cause Jen to block me? She is even answering my tweets in some cases in the past. Once, I used a funny phrase jokingly warning her that someone "would go all North Korea on her" and she responded saying she didn't know what that meant, and I responded back saying I had been planning on doing a tweet about something to her, and before my internet session I heard someone say "go all North Korea on you" on TV and thought it was funny and would work in that tweet. I say that here because that exchange did not cause her to block me. The last time her name came up automatically, re: autofill (signifying someone is not blocking you) when tweeting was when I did a tweet about her story about Earl's letting people park their cars there overnight and what the snowplow operators would think of that. After that, I didn't have a reason to tweet her for a while, and sometimes I look at my Twitter list and say, "I haven't seen that person in my timeline in a while," and check them out. That was the case with Jen, and that's how I found out she was blocking me.<br />
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And that's that. When Jen tells me WHY she is blocking me on Twitter, this post will be deleted. But it sure looks like this post will stay here forever.<br />
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P.S. Since there might be people on Twitter who don't go on The Beau Zone, and aren't reading this, those people - and you - might notice I continue to tweet "to" Jen (regarding stories she's written), which Twitter still allows, it's just that I have to completely type her handle - no autofill - because the general public doesn't know she is blocking me. Only you, reading this, know. (And I do plan to do a Facebook post that is only a link to this post, and hopefully that is okay with the faceless Facebook's bots, if that's what any future trouble I could have with Facebook is all about.) It's usually at the same time I am tweeting others, increasing the chances of those others replying or retweeting, meaning everyone out there is seeing those tweets EXCEPT Jen. I figure if she's going to block me, she should pay the price. Everyone will see my tweets "to her" EXCEPT her. Serves her right. And everyone reading this will see those tweets if you do a Twitter search on both our handles, or any relevant hashtags, as well. (My original email to Jen asking her why was written Sept. 4, 2017.)<br />
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I sure hate wasting time on negative issues like this. I want everyone including me to be positive, think positive, and go through the day with smiles on our faces and love in our hearts. But some things or people won't let us do that. That's a fact we just have to learn to live with, I guess.<br />
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Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-86706033880383597752017-10-26T09:44:00.000-07:002017-10-26T09:44:38.170-07:00Follow-Up To Last BlogI haven't blogged in almost two years. Wow.<br />
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And that's due to both the contents of my last blog below and what resulted from it. So I'll cover that now.<br />
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After my wholesaler job ended in February 2016, I couldn't get hired anywhere for a new day job, including our competitors. Part of that I'm sure had to do with the fact everything is online now, and I have difficulty with that because my internet is dialup. I can't afford high-speed. I do all my high-speed stuff either at the public library's computers, or at a coffee shop or library using their free WiFi with my laptop. All of my Hard Rock Heroes videos were uploaded in this manner; actually, most were uploaded at the Osborne Cyber Cafe before that place closed and became The Toad's new Whiskey Bar. Additionally, my area of expertise is extremely narrow; I'm proficient in the more office functions of a warehouse, like paperwork and buying/ordering. Not the warehouse functions of a warehouse, like using the forklift. As well, I am most certainly NOT going to make a different resume for every job I apply to: That is cruel and inhumane punishment. So the Osborne Village Resource Centre and their advice can sincerely go fuck themselves. I want every potential employer to know ALL of the skills I have and EVERYTHING I have done in the past on my resume so they have no opportunity to misjudge who I am or what I can do. I want to open up that street mailbox and pour a wheelbarrow of 75 photocopied resumes with everything on them into it, with someone who recieved one of those 75 applications hiring me, THAT'S the ideal scenerio. Sending to a simple email address is fine, too. And I would suggest that anyone who would tear up and not even look at a resume that is longer than 3 pages is someone who is not considering the fact some of us are 55 years old and have had many years in their lives to do a whole lot of things. I wrote up 17-page Call For Orders on sale prices on the entire Jamieson vitamin line to be sent to our stores at the same time I was doing interview legwork for Hard Rock Heroes. And I want employers to know that. And that, specifically, was never even in my resume, that at one time was 17 pages long! I did shorten it to three pages, but if I added my new job to it (next paragraph), it would be longer than that again.<br />
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So when a merchandiser job I applied to called me for an interview and offered me the job, I was too afraid to turn it down, even though the job is to work overnight on Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, with only Tuesday and Wednesday as my days off (my weekend) 52 weeks a year, with no long weekends. I had lost all of my Fridays and Saturdays, and there would be no such thing anymore as Christmas, New Year's Eve, Thanksgiving, Canada Day, etc., unless they fell on a Tuesday or Wednesday. Not only did I fall into a deep depression, I certainly had no time to blog anymore. I had to figure out when I was going to do everyday aspects of my life now with no long weekends to catch up on anything.<br />
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And certainly no broadcasting jobs came my way, although I received a few compliments for my Hard Rock Heroes work, including a nice one from CTV News Director Karen Mitchell. I thanked her on Twitter for her kind words.<br />
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After I had been at my new job for a year and qualified for holidays, I was able to negotiate those two weeks as only Thursday/Friday/Saturday holidays, where I would still work my "solo" shifts without my co-worker on Sunday/Monday, and take off four Saturdays instead. So it became not so bad in 2017, and the weather was absolutely excellent for almost all of my time off. It felt so exciting on that first day, Saturday, June 17, to see my first Saturday with all those people in the Exchange District around all the clubs for the first time in a year and a half! Much different from the barren depressing Wednesdays where everything's closed and no one's driving around except me and the cab drivers. Things were better in the summer for clubs on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, though. Thanks to The Pint and LaRoca and The Cavern for being there on Tuesdays and Wednesdays!<br />
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I will always be interested in broadcasting, though, so if anyone reading this in that industry is interested in me, you can still feel free to contact me and maybe we can make a deal. My contact info is in my last blog post below. <br />
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So maybe now, in the future, I can get back to doing blogs on regular things, not myself. Hopefully. We'll see.Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-35633268477189038522016-01-10T22:29:00.000-08:002017-08-19T13:07:31.656-07:00Would you like to hire me?So I'm losing my wholesaler day job after February 5.<br />
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I will be looking for a suitable replacement day job, including at our main competitor, but as far as this blog is concerned, I will also be re-stepping up my efforts to take my old TV show I used to produce and host, Hard Rock Heroes, to the next level, whatever that means. As an entertainment reporter? TV stations don't have that anymore. Maybe you can think of something that for someone in media I can be an asset to.<br />
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After Hard Rock Heroes ended, I had gotten busy at my day job with different hours, then the internet started and I eventually created the Hard Rock Heroes website. Then I found myself with enough time around 2002 to send resumes and tapes of my show to all the TV stations and a few radio stations. In that material I also talked of my interest in scheduling, and TV stations' scheduling/traffic deptartments. Then You Tube started, and I started uploading Hard Rock Heroes videos to You Tube. Then, instead of sending VHSs or DVDs in the mail, I started e-mailing links to all my You Tube videos.<br />
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But I haven't done that in a while, so now I have a reason to start that all over again. I might not get hired anywhere, but I have nothing to lose. I wonder if people are more aware of me now due not only to all of the above, but due to my Twitter presence, as well.<br />
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So if anyone in Winnipeg broadcasting is reading this and is interested in me, please drop me a line at <a HREF="mailto:beauh@mts.net">beauh@mts.net</A>.<br />
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Check out my Hard Rock Heroes videos at <a HREF="http://www.hardrockheroes.com">http://www.hardrockheroes.com</A>, click on "Video" for video. Or to go directly there: <a HREF="https://petrosal-variations.000webhostapp.com/video.html">https://petrosal-variations.000webhostapp.com/video.html</A><br />
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Check out my Linkedin page at <a HREF="http://www.linkedin.com/in/beau-hajavitch-09a09b49">http://www.linkedin.com/in/beau-hajavitch-09a09b49</A><br />
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For examples of a more journalistic style of writing, check out my band write-ups at my Zoo Archives page, all about the Osborne Village Inn's Zoo & Ozzy's bars at <a HREF="http://www.zooarchives.0catch.com">http://www.zooarchives.0catch.com</A> - this includes my editing of bands' bios to correct grammar, punctuation, and spelling mistakes, in case you see a band's bio you recognize (copy and paste is the best thing about computers).<br />
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For my radio voiceovers I did with daCapo, check out that page as part of my Hard Rock Heroes site at <a HREF="https://petrosal-variations.000webhostapp.com/voiceovers.html">https://petrosal-variations.000webhostapp.com/voiceovers.html</A><br />
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And my Twitter page is at <a HREF="http://www.twitter.com/beauhajavitch">http://www.twitter.com/beauhajavitch</A><br />
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If I get a day job, will I remove this blog entry? Good question. Not sure about that yet.<br />
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Thanks for your time, and I hope you've enjoyed The Beau Zone so far.Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-42491799593702554452015-12-14T00:01:00.000-08:002015-12-14T00:01:56.992-08:00Winnipeg's Downtown Snackeries: After The MTS Centre Lovin', Can We Still Be In Love With You?Winnipeg mayor Brian Bowman's recent spat with Mark Chipman makes me think of something else Bowman could hold against him, if he wishes. If he even knows about it. If there is an agreement in place.<br />
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I'd rather do a letter to the editor on this to both of Winnipeg's newspapers but I don't know for sure if there really is an agreement in place or not here. I think I saw this being reported in years past, but buried deep in stories about other aspects of True North building the MTS Centre and bringing the Jets back to town, and with only a few quick words before changing the subject.<br />
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I speak of the believed-to-be agreement between the city of Winnipeg and True North to do everything in its' power to make sure any nearby convenience stores, donut shops, and fast-food outlets are NOT open after MTS Centre events are over. And that no more of these are built, either.<br />
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There are several Tim Horton's and Subway outlets near the MTS Centre. They're all closed at night. Only one real fast-food restaurant, McDonald's in Cityplace. Also closed at night. And most McDonald's stores are open 24 hours, too. The Cityplace store could stay open until 4:00 a.m. to service Shark Club customers (both the nightclub and casino), too. But, no. I think the closest places within walking distance are Robin's Donuts at York & Garry, Mac's Convenience Store at Carlton & Cumberland, and Jumbo Pizza on Balmoral near Sargent. If you consider any of those within walking distance.<br />
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The Bargain Shop right outside the MTS Centre just closed. That would have been an ideal location for a convenience store. If you want to hang out outside the MTS Centre afterward in the dead of summer checking out the girls, go in the store and buy yourself a bag of chips. Or a chocolate bar. Or a slurpee. You don't want a full restaurant meal, just something small. As it turned out, the store became a Dollar Tree. Is it open at night? No.<br />
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Mark Chipman wants us all to buy the overpriced food at MTS Centre or nothing. So I believed he brokered some klind of backroom deal with the city when the MTS Centre first opened to make sure nothing was open close to the building after their events.<br />
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But that was in 2004, even before the Winnipeg Jets came back. Or now, the Moose. The MTS Centre is well established now. It's time to rescind this outdated agreement and allow the Tim Horton's and Subways and McDonald's and Starbucks near the building to be open after their events, and to allow new fast-food, donut, and convenience stores to open. Ironically, there is a Tim Hortons right inside the MTS Centre, and that, too, is closed after the events are over. But if you think that's to clear out the building, well, they are still selling that night's performing rock band's overpriced t-shirts after the events.<br />
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That's what, along with people living downtown, will really spark a street scene of people on the streets downtown. Not just traditional restaurants and nightclubs.<br />
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So there's a story idea for all you Winnipeg newspaper guys (and I know you love reading this blog), if in fact there is such an agreement. If there isn't, then it's those places I named that all suck for not being open after the events. (And the Subway on Notre Dame beside Solid Gold could grab the bar crowd, too.)<br />
Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-87301276117498809252015-02-15T13:59:00.000-08:002015-02-15T13:59:18.220-08:00Bell Media Part 2: They had 91 layoffs and you might be oneWhenever I've tried to brainstorm ideas of what to blog about next, this Bell Media thing keeps coming back to me.<br />
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Because when I wrote my Bell Media/MuchMusic blog entry last time, even with all I brought up in it, that was still before they.....wait for it.....laid off 91 employees, mostly at Much, M3, and MTV Canada.<br />
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So now, I guess I have to do a followup.<br />
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Talk about being dumbfounded.<br />
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Something is clearly wrong with this company.<br />
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Isn't Bell Media supposedly the biggest private broadcaster in Canada? And they can't financially run these channels adequately? (Without telling us why not, as I reiterate my last blog's theme.)<br />
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In addition to all my observations and complaints last blog about what Bell Media has done to Much (formerly MuchMusic, I hate to say but must), those 91 layoffs mean that almost all the on-air personalities known as VJs that were on Much (most of which Bell Media had moved to other channels after they got rid of Much's flagship show New.Music.Live and replaced the MuchMusic Environment with the studio for CTV's The Social) are now gone, except for Tyrone Edwards and Chloe Wilde, who are still on E! Canada, and Liz Trinnear, now the sole VJ on Much. Much, M3, and MTV Canada now run on skeleton crews, and Much now has only one produced show, the Much Countdown, hosted by Liz. Liz still interviews music stars in the Bell Media building (after they're finished with ETalk, I'm sure), but those interviews run online, and now as insets during the videos on the Much Countdown (a good idea, but I'll come back to this). The rest of the schedule consists of morning videos (that extend into the afternoon and even the evening on some days), the fratboy comedies, and back-to-back Simpsons and South Park reruns. Also back-to-back Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air reruns which, after seemingly forever, they aren't even dropping in favor of another rerun show. This past Christmas season, if you remember all the hour-long review shows the former MuchMusic used to do, like Hisses, Disses, and Kisses, well, Much still did two or three of those, but they were around two minutes long and ran during the commercials on Much and online. Hey, at least they're trying, but, as I said in the brackets, I'll come back to that subject. And Tanya Kim was laid off from ETalk.<br />
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How can Bell Media, all of a sudden, decide they can't afford to keep these channels going in a proper manner? Something fishy is going on here, and it's more than just Bell Media taking the MuchMusic Environment away from them and giving that studio space to The Social. And, yeah, that is exactly what happened, as I finally got confirmation on that from, of all people, Jess Allen, on The Social itself, when they were promoting the 30 Years Of Much half-hour special (only half an hour?; more on that later) and they were showing clips of all the music stars that came to the building to play songs in the MuchMusic Environment and, in between songs, answered fan questions and walked up to Much's huge Queen Street storefront window where Much regularly took the glass out so the fans outside could be a part of the show, and signed autographs from those fans and answered their questions, and Jess says, "And that all took place in this very room!" Bless you, Jess. I wonder if she wasn't supposed to say that, because I wonder if Bell Media didn't want anyone pointing out that those days are actually over now, and that there won't be any more stars coming to Much to play and promote any more. I wonder if the MMVAs are no more now, as well.<br />
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Whatever Bell Media's financial problems are, clearly, what they are doing now is this: They are simply holding onto these channels for as long as they can so that the competition doesn't acquire them. Because if anyone out there thinks they can do a better job at running them (and I'm hearing rumblings that Ed The Sock might be getting involved in a new music video channel - no, really) and they think Bell Media has lost interest and will sell to them, guess again. If Bell Media sells to them, that will make the buyer a Bell Media competitor. Bell Media doesn't want that. And Bell Media can probably still charge top advertising rates for portions of these channels' programming, because the actual shows themselves - from Pretty Little Liars to Reign to Broad City to Workaholics - are fine shows and attract audiences. If the audience wants to watch these shows, they'll watch them on whatever channel they're on. That's a different issue than the issue of them being on the wrong channel, that I discussed in my last blog. I'm sure Bell Media does advertising package deals that involve these channels plus CTV and CTV Two, too. <br />
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Yet what defies logic in Bell Media's stance is how they think they can get away with next to no CanCon (Canadian content) on these channels as per their conditions of license with the CRTC for these channels. When does their renewal hearing come up? When it does, they will undoubtebly be hauled onto the carpet by the CRTC. I don't know how much produced CanCon content they are supposed to provide vs. purchased CanCon, but on MTV Canada, there is zero produced content now, and next to nothing for purchased CanCon. When MTV Canada were at the Masonic Temple building on Yonge Street, they did lots of produced content: MTV Live (I saw a taping), MTV Aftershow, 5 Gays 1 Girl, MTV News. When they moved into the main CTV building at 299 Queen Street West, MTV Live turned into Showtown, but that, and everything else, is now gone. I thought the reason for that content in the first place was to fulfill Bell Media's CRTC license requirements. As said, Much has one produced show, the Countdown, and a few between-commercials Liz Trinnear segments, and that's it. M3, for whatever reason, mostly carries on, as they didn't have too much produced content to begin with, so Gabby Henderson replaces the departed Matt Wells, and they mostly just carry on. So it appears the CRTC will either force Bell Media to live up to their conditions of license at a "show cause" hearing, or take the channels away from Bell Media themselves. Why would Bell Media open themselves up to that? If Bell Media was going to do what they did, instead of laying off 91 people, why not lay off only 75 and keep some more produced content on these channels (especially MTV Canada) to secure their licences? It doesn't make sense.<br />
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Now, to be fair, the remaining staff Bell Media has at Much does at least appear to be making lemonade out of lemons. These blogs I have been writing have nothing to do with them; they're just doing their jobs, and they appear to be doing them quite well. After I tweeted to Much, "You don't even have the resources to take those great Liz Trinnear interviews and edit them into a half-hour show?" they.....well, they didn't do that, but they at least run parts of them now in inset interviews on the Much Countdown during the videos. I told them that's a good idea, because on a countdown show, the videos can get repetitive, so those inset interviews relieve any boredom that might set in. They have done some interesting things with the blocks of videos that still remain in the New.Music.Live time slot: Brought back the Spotlight (one artist's videos) one night a week, made another night new videos called "Brand New Shit," made another night videos curated (chosen) by a famous artist, and made Thursday a Throwback Thursday night. All of which are still just videos with no host, no nothing, just the videos, but it's better than just regular videoflow. Because if the morning videoflow (and even that was retitled "Playlist") is too early for people to catch up on videos, you can always tape it while you sleep or work. I've done that. And at least Much did do those two-minute Holiday Wrap "shows" with Liz I brought up above. They could have done nothing. (Because I don't think two-minute segments fulfills license requirements.)<br />
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Then there's the curious show they did called "30 Years Of Much." For the last several years, Much has driven away screaming from its' past, because their most recent audience had been teenage girls screaming over The Jonas Brothers and One Direction, and Much didn't want to drive them away by suggesting their parents watched Much in the '80s and '90s in the form of referring to/airing their past all the time. But Bell Media bigwigs canned Much from airing anything that audience was interested in, as I covered last blog, except early morning videoflow, so I suppose the creative people (person?) still left at Much thought they had nothing to lose by mining their past and putting those segments together to create 30 Years Of Much. That show might have even been a way for the people still left at Much to shove the middle finger in Bell Media's face, as if to say, "See how much BETTER things were when Much did all this stuff, mostly when Moses ran the place?" So I looked forward to it, and wondered if it would be an hour or two hours. But it turned out to be only HALF AN HOUR?!?!? Of course: Much doesn't have the resources to make it more than half an hour. I'll bet Winnipeg's Shaw TV Community Channel has more resources today than Much does.<br />
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Oh, and CTV President Kevin Crull says people are watching music videos online now. The big problem with that argument is that when people are in control of what they want to watch, they won't punch up videos or artists that they don't know. How would they know about them? Killing new artists is killing the lifeblood of the industry. Today, I STILL come into contact with new artists and current artists' new videos for the first time ("Oh, that artist has a new video? I didn't know that!") by watching the early-morning videos on Much, maybe on tape later as I'm sleeping when they're on. Because Much is controlling what I see and is surprising me and introducing me to things. Someone online, like me, can't do that for himself. Someone has to do it for him.<br />
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Throughout my youth and early adulthood, I never found anything I wanted to be. Maybe I'm smart enough for university, but there was never anything taught there that I gave a shit about. I just looked at a job as a needed way to finance my personal life, to give me the money I needed to buy records by Kiss and Cheap Trick and Van Halen and Streetheart and to discuss the intellectual ramifications of those records at drunken house parties. I never found my calling, until I discovered MTV U.S. and then MuchMusic. To this day, all I ever wanted to be was a VJ on Muchmusic. And, while I never made that goal a reality, partly because of my age, I did accomplish the next best thing: I created my own TV show, Hard Rock Heroes, and became a VJ on that show. I mentioned my age; I turned 30 in 1992, right in the middle of the Hard Rock Heroes period. <br />
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So to see all of this crap go down with Bell Media and Much and MTV Canada and M3 is not only disheartening, it is cruel, it is heartache, it is inhumane, and it is barbaric. To think that VJs on camera talking about music and artists and throwing to videos all day is something that became too expensive to provide is both head-scratching and pain-inducing. People are passionate about their businesses. Well, this is MY business. And I want to see it survive and thrive, not get kicked in the head like a home invader does to a dog like Bell Media has done.<br />
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Hopefully, this story isn't over yet. Hopefully in the coming days the CRTC will investigate why Canada's biggest private broadcaster can't make these channels work. Hopefully someone will come forth and start-up a new music video service with VJs, whether it's on one of the Bell Media channels, if the CRTC takes them away from Bell, or a new channel. Hopefully someone will fix this. Someone MUST fix this! And hopefully whatever the public has been watching on the internet is just a supplement to TV viewing and hasn't really been enough to drive audiences away from channels like Much, unlike what some in the media might think. Audiences of all ages must be educated (re-educated?) to believe, know, and understand, that the music-video/VJ format is not an outdated concept or a fad; that it is as standard a television format as the late-night talk show format is, and that is is simply Bell Media that is trying to kill it. They must become hungry enough (are they already?) that when someone brings it back fully, it will be flocked to and embraced.<br />
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If those things don't happen, both the music industry (especially the Canadian artists), music culture, and yes, even pop culture, will ultimately suffer for it.<br />
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Bell Media, is that what you want?<br />
Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-54182297836800719432014-04-25T15:06:00.002-07:002014-04-26T12:34:04.534-07:00Why is Bell Media trying to sabotage MuchMusic?It was June 2007 when the CRTC approved the bid of CTV - in the form of their then-corporate moniker of CTVglobemedia - to acquire the CHUM specialty channels, which included MuchMusic, Muchmore (formerly Muchmoremusic), MTV Canada, and E! Canada, among others.<br />
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Since that time, I had been impressed for several years with how CTV not only didn't tinker with CHUM's winning formula for MuchMusic - including its' iconic storefront headquarters at 299 Queen Street West in Toronto, home to the "MuchMusic environment" in the northwest corner of the building, right at Queen and John - but actually enhanced it in small nuances by adding its' own ETalk studios to the building and cross-branding the two by doing such things as adding ETalk to the MuchMusic Video Awards' (MMVA) red carpet, but still being careful not to alienate the younger, hipper Much fans by ever actually showing the ETalk personalities on Much. Telethons and TV commercials featured all CTV/Much/MTV personalities together ("love is louder") but that was the extent of it.<br />
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Now, Bell Media has taken over CTVglobemedia. If that fact is relevant to what you are about to read. And it probably is.<br />
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And what has Bell Media now done to the historically fabled MuchMusic? <br />
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Lots. And all of it bad. Suddenly, they have: 1) Cancelled Much's flagship show New.Music.Live. 2) Taken off all of Much's non-music shows that appealed to an audience who had interest in Much's music programming and replaced them with fratboy U.S. Comedy Central shows that have nothing to do with Much, and, likewise, South Park and reruns of The Simpsons and The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon; the shows that aren't on Much anymore have been reassigned to other Bell Media channels. 3) Removed all but two of the "MuchMusic VJs," if they're still even called that, from Much and have sent them to do things on the other Bell Media channels. 4) This one is pure speculation on my part, but my gut tells me that New.Music.Live's cancellation had to do with the removal (?) of the famous "MuchMusic Environment," as it was called in the CHUM days, and its' space given to.....The Social? Now, I love CTV's new View-styled gabfest with the four saucy ladies, but that studio they're in looks suspiciously big, so I wonder if it was taken away from Much to give to them. Can anyone reading this in Toronto confirm or deny? What remains of Much's music programming is done on a small set that is in no way indicative of the "MuchMusic Environment" and I can't decide if it's done on a small sliver of space left intact at Queen and John (with the windows covered up) or if it's just some room on the second floor somewhere. Either way, don't expect any more "Live At Much" or "Intimate And Interactive" shows any longer, if the space is not Much's space any more, and the streetside windows are permanently closed as a result.<br />
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What makes this even more mystifying is the fact this space was just renovated in 2010 in the first place, as part of the renovation that took us from the Much On Demand era to the New.Music.Live era. Well, that was before Bell or Bell Media came onto the scene, I guess.<br />
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Some background is required here for non-Torontonions: Although we non-Toronto Canadians have referred to this building as the "MuchMusic building," it was actually the CHUM/City building before CTV took over CHUM. Toronto's local City TV station was located there as well. The CRTC didn't let CTV take over City TV. So City TV had to find new owners and move out. So CTV then moved in. So the building is still home to more than MuchMusic. It always was. But the potential is certainly there for a new owner, like Bell Media, that might not believe in, or understand, MuchMusic (keep reading) to downgrade the channel's prominent studio space in favor of studio space for their other channels, since it is the CTV building, after all, and the new owner might wonder why so much space and resources was devoted to this one, out of many, channels. And it looks like that is what has happened.<br />
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I recall a version of this company - not sure which version - applying to the CRTC to air less music video programming as a condition of their license. The CRTC denied it.<br />
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I say that, as well as the observations in the paragraph before that, because I believe that Bell Media not only doesn't understand MuchMusic, but doesn't want Much to even be a music video channel any longer.<br />
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Look at the evidence: The music videos now run from 5:00 a.m. to noon-ish each day. Not exactly prime viewing time for a young audience that is either sleeping or in school or working during those hours. Today's Top 10 and the Countdown still continue, and with the only two VJs Much retained, Liz Trinnear and Scotty Willats, but virtually no other music programming does. Obviously, Bell Media is only doing this to satisfy the requirements of their CRTC license that states that Much has to appear to be some kind of music video channel with a certain number of hours devoted to music videos. And they have even (not sure if it's official or unofficial) apparently changed the name of the channel from "MuchMusic" to just plain "Much." They're airing promos that promise Much this, Much that, with "music" being just one of the options, but they didn't say what that really meant was that they were replacing the Much shows that appealed to fans - mostly girls, but whatever (keep reading) - of current pop and hip-hop music with immature fratboy comedy shows whose audience isn't the slightest bit interested in music shows and whose passed out and hungover bodies certainly won't be tuning in to Much at 9:00 a.m. to view the music videos.<br />
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I will say this: With message boards dropping left and right, it's hard to find people saying things on the internet anymore, unless you're on Facebook, but I did read somewhere there was supposed to be some kind of replacement show for New.Music.Live. All this time later, it looks like maybe that report was incorrect, but Much does appear to be holding that time slot for some reason. They are, in addition to what I said last paragraph, also airing just an hour of music videos in the show's old time slot. Unless it's a CRTC requirement that they play music videos for at least one hour in almost-prime time.<br />
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But WHY would Bell Media sabotage its' MuchMusic channel like this?<br />
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WHY would Bell Media want to turn this channel from a music-oriented channel into a fratboy comedy channel? (Oh yeah, and I will acknowledge the retained Video On Trial does satisfy Bell Media's apparent new desire here.)<br />
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WHY has Bell Media not retained the interest in keeping MuchMusic the way it was that CTV and CTVglobemedia apparently did?<br />
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Not only is this is the hardest part of this blog entry to discuss, it's overall a hard blog entry to write, too, due to all the little details here, there, and everywhere, and no clear order to put everything you're reading in. Plus I want to make sure I don't forget anything. As a result, this blog was written at three different sit-downs. So let's discuss:<br />
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See, the fact, if it's so, that Much has lost much of their "environment," doesn't have to have anything to do with all these fratboy comedy shows Much has acquired. Much's music programming could adapt to the loss of the "environment," even if the adaption results were less than stellar. The fact these comedy shows are on the channel could signal a couple of things: <br />
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1) Maybe there was a desire at Bell Media to attempt to increase the audience of the channels that they gave Much's former programming to. Maybe people had forgotten that Muchmore existed, or that MTV Canada ever did exist. Maybe the audience for both Much and the Much shows was so strong that Bell Media figured that by sending Pretty Little Liars and The Vampire Diaries to Muchmore (now M3 - keep reading for more on that) and by sending Awkward and Degrassi to MTV Canada, that they would send those audiences to those channels as well, perhaps increasing viewership for other shows on those channels, and not decreasing Much's audience because everyone knows Much and will tune into Much anyway. Some people might actually not even be aware what is happening on Much's channel with this horrible move to replace the shows I mentioned with the immature fratboy comedy shows. It may not dawn on them until later. Maybe after this summer is over and they've realized there haven't been any "Live At Much" shows.<br />
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2) As I said, in the U.S., these new fratboy comedy shows air on Comedy Central, whose overall schedule I'm not familiar with. In Canada, there may have been a desire by Bell Media to not intermix these fratboy comedy shows with the more traditional brands of comedy that The Comedy Network (also a Bell Media channel) seems to air. Why, I don't know. I'm just grasping at straws here. Certainly Teletoon airs edgier fare at night. Why couldn't The Comedy Network air Workaholics or Broad City or The Kroll Show instead of Much airing them? Maybe it's simply a case of, when you combine what I said last paragraph with this, what WOULD Bell Media put on Much? They have to air something! That's what makes part of me think that the only reason Much airs these fratboy comedy shows was because someone high above decreed they were going to build this big set for The Social and that they didn't care that it took away the MuchMusic environment, and that they were going to just not worry about the Much channel until later. Maybe Bell Media just doesn't even know what to do with this channel anymore because they think it's a "lost cause" because they can't just dump the music video coverage due to the conditions of their CRTC license for the channel which they acquired from CHUM. Either way, keeping Much as the MuchMusic of old, the way the channel was when Erica Ehm and Steve Anthony were VJs there, just isn't a priority, or even a desire, anymore, by the new owners, Bell Media. And back then, MuchMusic didn't need a flagship show, because interviews were just done whenever the stars stopped by throughout the day, because the whole channel was music videos all day, except for a select few one-hour shows devoted to music genres. Eventually, for fans who couldn't watch all day, highlights were aired on half-hour music news shows like Fax or Much News Weekly.<br />
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This is made even more complicated by the new M3 Countdown show. Okay, here we go: Now we'll start talking about M3/Muchmore.<br />
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M3 used to be Muchmore, which used to be Muchmoremusic. It was originally created as a Canadian version of the U.S.' VH1, which means a music video channel that would appeal to people older than the Much demographic. It aired Sarah Mclachlan music videos, music nostalgia shows, and old prime-time reruns that would appear to a music-video crowd.<br />
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But now, here's another channel that seemingly Bell Media doesn't know what to do with.<br />
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First, they rename it "M3." What does "M3" stand for? Is it short for Muchmoremusic? Wait a sec, the channel was called Muchmore. They had already shortened it to that from Muchmoremusic years ago. So shouldn't it be called "M2" now? Unless they thought people would think "M2" stands for MuchMusic. There has already been confusion over the years between the two channels when people would write online that something was on "MuchMusic" when they really meant Muchmore. But now, no one would definitely have a clue what "M3" indicates.<br />
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Then they use it to air shows like Mike And Molly and The Mentalist that have no appeal whatsoever to music-video fans. If those series are first-run (not sure), then obviously M3 is being used as a dumping ground for shows Bell Media can't find room for on either CTV or CTV2. Now, as mentioned earlier, they sent shows like Pretty Little Liars and The Vampire Diaries to M3 for whatever reason, as well. Would the teen-girl-pop-fans who watch those shows, as well as new ones that started after all this happened, like Reign, like the rest of the M3 channel? Well, even before everything in this blog entry happened, Muchmore's music video playlist had started inching closer to Much's playlist. And honestly, very recently I just haven't had the time to adequately compare the videos on the two channels. But it could be irrelevant anyway, since M3 appears to air the videos all cuddled up in those morning time slots as well. It's possible Bell Media has given up on the idea of Much and M3 having two distinct playlists of music videos with only slight overlap.<br />
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Maybe Bell Media also considers this channel to be a "lost cause" due to the music video/CRTC requirements. But more of a channel they can do something with, since it doesn't have the "youth" stigma. So they fill it up with all sorts of prime-time series that overall appeal to a broad range of age groups.<br />
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Which brings me back to the new M3 Countdown show that kicked off this M3 section.<br />
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Someone realized that without New.Music.Live on Much, there was no outlet for interviews with artists on Much. So, instead of doing anything in that regard that would air on Much, which at least still, after all these years had past, purported to appeal to album-buying music fans, even if that crowd is now just a cult audience, which is why Much went for the teen-girl One Direction fan audience to begin with, because that audience was at least still interested in music and pop culture (how's this for a run-on sentence?), someone came up with the idea to put that stuff on a new show on M3 that included a countdown. The show itself is fine, and it reminds me a bit of the old CBC '70s radio show 90 Minutes With A Bullet. But its' existence on M3, combined with the sort of artists profiled and interviewed that would have in the past been on either Much or Muchmore, seem to further underline the erasing of the lines that defined Much and Muchmore to begin with, and in favor of.....what? In favor of keeping Matt Wells employed on M3 because he wouldn't fit in on Much? (Well, he does appeal to older people, and both Much's "former" audience, and the audience they seemingly want to appeal to now have one thing in common: youth.)<br />
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All of this makes me wonder what a Bell Media executive would say if you asked him. "What are your target audiences for Much and M3 now?" Or "What are the formats of Much and M3 supposed to be now?" I think that executive wouldn't even know. I think he might have asked his superiors that question already, and that his superiors shot him down, as their decisions I have detailed here were all knee-jerk reactions to one issue or another that they don't wish to discuss. Who knows, maybe someone at Bell Media just wanted to get rid of the teen-girl Much audience (why, don't they buy products?) and the only way they knew how to do it was to disperse everything on the channel to their other channels to fragment that audience and break it away from exclusively watching Much, before, maybe, eventually, in the future, turning Much into something substantial again?!?! Meaning they thought perhaps they couldn't do that M3 Countdown show on Much? <br />
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Or maybe it's just goes back to the simple issue I stated earlier of this new company basically not understanding what MuchMusic is to Canadians and basically thinking of it as just one of many channels they own, and treating (or in this case, abusing) it as such. (I've assumed your knowledge of this so far, but to anyone who doesn't know: At one time MuchMusic was City TV's only specialty channel. There was no Muchmoremusic or anything else. So most of that building was divided in half: One-half devoted to City TV, and one-half devoted to the MuchMusic Environment. That's what started MuchMusic as a "big deal" in Canada besides the music-video revolution of the '80s.)<br />
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I haven't e-mailed my concerns to anyone at Bell Media for two reasons: 1) It's easier to do this blog first. Heck, I can just send this blog's link via Twitter or e-mail to Bell Media executives, I don't have to even use copy and paste. And, 2) over the winter, I already was having a heated e-mail exchange with Bell Media executives over my quest to find out why Bell Media had taken away all evening E! channel broadcasts of ETalk, leaving Winnipeggers to watch ETalk for the first time of the night at 10:30 p.m. CST on both CTV Winnipeg (CKY) and E! (coincidentally the same time), unless they had the Canadian Time Shift package that cable offers, like I do. You see, in the Central Time Zone, we go from local news into prime-time programming, one hour earlier. So the Big Bang Theory rerun/ETalk hour airs AFTER that, unlike the other time zones where that hour airs after suppertime local news. But we had access to ETalk on E! at 5:00 p.m. CST, and a rerun at 7:30 p.m. Those are gone now. So, for myself, I can continue to watch/tape it at 5:00 p.m. but it will be on ATV in the Maritimes. Or at 6:00 p.m. on CFTO Toronto. Or at 8:00 p.m. on CFCN Calgary. Or 9:00 p.m. on CTVBC (don't know the call letters). But Winnipeggers without that package have to wait until 10:30 p.m. now. And I just could not find out from Bell Media the reasons WHY. All they would say was in the form of an executive from E!, who said, "We feature the premiere airing of the show as a single feed in a timeslot when the majority of our viewers can watch it across the country." That's it. What the hell does that mean? They won't tell me. That's from someone at E!, so are they talking about THEIR first airing, which is at 10:30 p.m. CST? If so, their answer makes no sense, as 10:30 p.m. is many hours after CTV airs it, except for here in Winnipeg. It sounds like it means that the "we" in that answer means the CTV network and that the executive is not just an E! executive, but has a regular CTV network position as well, meaning he is speaking for both the CTV network and the E! channel, and that he means that by taking it off E! until 10:30 p.m., that they filter all the formerly fragmented viewers into the CTV airings, creating higher ratings. So why don't they TELL me that, instead of me coming up with (i.e., SPECULATING, which is just that: speculating) that myself? And again, that doesn't help Winnipeggers without the Canadian Time Shift package. So I'm not crazy to open up another can of worms this soon, unless it's with different people. It may be, it may not be. But for now, I'll let this blog stand on its' own and worry what else I'll do with it after I have it up.<br />
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So, now that I think I have gotten in all the most pertinent points, what happens now? Where is this headed? Is this the end of the famous MuchMusic channel as generations of fans have known it since 1984? Are these "changes" just more crap that we music and media fans have to just learn to suck up and live with because answers will not be forthcoming? Or will someone with connections at least use this blog as inspiration to write a book detailing all the answers? Because I, at least, am not satisfied with what Bell Media has done to Much, and, to a lesser extent, M3. (MTV Canada's content always was dictated by what MTV U.S. does, and Awkward is actually an MTV show. So I haven't written much here about that channel. Degrassi might work on it. Without MTV Live/Showtown and all those MTV News airings that have mostly disappeared, how do they get their CanCon requirements in, I wonder? And MTV Canada operates on CTV's old Talk TV license, so they never did have a license to air music videos. This was a venture CTV initiated before they took over CHUM, so that's why MTV Canada and Much both existed by the same company in the first place. CTV/CTVglobemedia/Bell Media haven't actually shut down any of the channels they acquired.) They have sabotaged MuchMusic. This blog is at least one thing I can do to show that someone out there in music/media fandom will not let Much sink without putting up some kind of a fight. <br />
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Bell Media, it's your turn. You owe us Canadians, your viewing audience, an explanation.<br />
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What are you doing?<br />
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What have you done?<br />
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And WHY?Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-80971883994218034422014-01-06T02:41:00.001-08:002014-01-06T02:41:17.816-08:00Home Town Improvement: Last Man Standing's Winnipeg ConnectionWinnipeg has had more than its' share of mentions as part of the dialogue by characters on various U.S. prime-time TV comedies and dramas over the last several years. Possibly because of the David Steinberg influence: Big-time/long-time director/comedian/actor Steinberg hails from Winnipeg, so I think "Winnipeg" is put into the dialogue and plots of these shows as a spoof/inside rib directed to/about him.<br />
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But there's been a new one in the past year or so, and it's my favorite. It's also part of a background to a permanent character, so it's not just an isolated Winnipeg reference mentioned in only one episode, it's continuous.<br />
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And it has yet to be mentioned in any Winnipeg newspapers, believe it or not.<br />
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It's Tim Allen's new sitcom, Last Man Standing, that airs Friday nights on ABC.<br />
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I started watching it by accident last year, as it came on at a good time for me each week. I think it had been on for a year or so already before I found it.<br />
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Now, being the horndog I am, I, of course, started watching it for all the sex humor involving Mandy, Mike's (Allen's character) free-spirited middle daughter.<br />
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But, as it turns out, Mike's eldest daughter, Kristin, has a child with her ex, who she has been slowly getting back together with, and his name is Ryan, and he's from.....WINNIPEG!!!<br />
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Last season, for example, one episode dealt with Ryan's parents wanting the couple and their child, Boyd, to come live with them in Winnipeg. Kristen doesn't want to. She says, "First of all, because it's Winnipeg," with a yucky look on her face. They end up not moving. Hey, where were the nasty-but-good-natured comments in the papers about that?<br />
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This season, on the Halloween episode, a few family members were discussing the day before Halloween. Now, I zoned out for a sec and didn't hear what someone said they called it, but I did hear Ryan follow up with, "In Winnipeg, growing up, we called it Cabbage Night." (Cabbage Night? I never heard of that. We - in the mid '70s, when I was around 15 - always called it Gate Night. I tweeted that to the show.)<br />
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So it's a running gag that Ryan is from Winnipeg. But it also adds another dimension to the show. You see, Mike is an old-school Republican (i.e., he hasn't gone out of his mind, kind of like Will McAvoy hasn't, either) and he and Ryan frequently debate U.S. politics, with Ryan taking the Democrats' side, as Ryan is a staunch left winger, reminiscent of Mike Stivic (the "meathead") on All In The Family. Meaning these whole exchanges are reminiscent of the Archie Bunker/Stivic All In The Family arguments. Except on this show, the dynamic includes the fact Ryan is from Winnipeg, as that takes into account Canadians overall being more left-leaning than Americans. (With our Conservative Party not leaning as far to the right as the U.S. Republican Party.)<br />
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Therefore, this show, as a result, has it all: This whole Winnipeg thing with Ryan, the aforementioned Mandy sexpot stuff (and Kristin's pretty hot, too), and even the occasional Home Improvement inside joke thrown in for good measure whenever a cast member from that show makes a guest appearance. Like when Johnathan Taylor Thomas appears as Kristin's boss at the restaurant, and Mike takes another shot at Ryan by telling JTT's character, "You're like a son to me."<br />
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Only thing that's unexplained is this: How does someone from Winnipeg drive a beer truck in the United States (Ryan's job)? How did U.S. Immigration let him cross the border to live in the U.S. if he just drives a beer truck? Maybe we'll find that out some day. Maybe he has dual citizenship if his mother gave birth to him when they were visiting the U.S., kind of like Chris Jericho. He could have a green card if he was married to Kristin, but I believe that does not entitle him to work. And I don't believe they were married, just boyfriend and girlfriend, but someone correct me if I'm wrong.<br />
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So there's the tip: For the best in "Winnipeg" humor, watch Last Man Standing Fridays at 7:00 p.m. CST on ABC! <br />
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(Or could this "Ryan From Winnipeg" thing have anything to do with the fact that Wendy Crewson, Tim Allen's co-star in the three "Santa Clause" movies, is from Winnipeg?)<br />
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(And Mandy: You're a legal adult at 18. Please come up to Winnipeg where becoming a legal adult means you CAN drink booze and go to nightclubs. Maybe you could visit Ryan's family while you're at it. You know how grating it is to constantly see other characters take glasses of booze out of your 18-year old hands when here, ever since 1970, YOU ARE LEGAL TO DRINK ALCOHOL? Maybe I'll have to visit that family and buy Mandy some booze. I would have no problem whatsoever supplying alcohol to anyone in the U.S. between 18 and 21. My conscience is clear. I have been influenced by my Winnipeg surroundings. I can't be "reformed.")<br />
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Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-70753772020236600502013-10-07T01:03:00.001-07:002013-10-07T01:03:54.691-07:00Winnipeg's Arena Area (AA): The Magic Is GoneWinnipeg Stadium. Polo Park. The Red River Ex. Chi-Chi's. McDonald's on St. James Street. And the grande dame of all, the Winnipeg Arena.<br />
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The demolition of Canad Inns Stadium, the successor moniker of Winnipeg Stadium, is now finished. That now completes the long, drawn-out end to the wonderful era people my age have been fortunate to live through (and be the right age for), the era when this unofficial entertainment conglomerate comprising the two largest Winnipeg music venues, combined with the best shopping and fast-food Winnipeg has to offer, added to the magic and excitement that your favorite world-class music acts visiting Winnipeg, brings.<br />
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This conglomerate never had an official name, did it? At least a name for Winnipeg Arena and Winnipeg Stadium together. Everything in this area was just described as being "around the arena." I ponder whether, had everything stayed, someone would have finally come up with, like Black Friday and the SHED, a formal or informal moniker for this heavenly area. So for this blog post, we'll just refer to it as "The Arena Area (AA)."<br />
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What made this AA so special? Some things that were obvious, some not so obvious.<br />
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Obviously, the fact Winnipeg Arena and Winnipeg Stadium, the two biggest places in town to attend concerts by music's hottest stars, were across the street from each other was the most obvious factor. (And I'm not going to use the "close proximity" term because that sounds like they were 2 blocks from each other; No, they were friggin' ACROSS THE STREET from each other.)<br />
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Winnipeg Arena had such a comfortable, down-home quality to it. It was like an old shoe that fits just right. You could go anywhere, downstairs or upstairs. During AWA wrestling cards, you could go downstairs and see the barricaded area that contained the hallway the wrestlers would walk through in the centre of the building to get to the arena bowl. You could peer through the cracks and maybe see the wrestlers! Maybe you could hear them. One time, there were too many people crowded around "the cracks" but I could hear Mad Dog Vachon's voice from the barricade's other side loud and clear from a few feet away from that barricade. When you are in the concession area, and you walked around to the portion that was behind the stage, there were no curtains or security guards like MTS Centre today has: You could walk right into the section and peer at the gear being stored behind the stage. Who knows, maybe you'd see one of the band members talking to a crew member if you were lucky! And up to probably well into the '80s, there was only ONE entry point into the floor area (split into two, actually - one at the left, one at the right). The ticket checker couldn't catch everybody, so if you maneuvered right and picked your spot when he was busy looking at the ticket of someone who took too much time, you could sneak through, and that was it! YOU MADE IT INTO THE ENTIRE FLOOR AREA! There were no ticket checkers stationed all over the floor area back then, checking your ticket five times as you made your way up to your third-row seat, should that be your legitimate seat. I did this for Van Halen's 1984 tour when my ticket was for an upper deck seat. Instead of sitting way up there, I was smooshed and squeezed in like sardines up front with a thousand other people in the first-few-rows area with my feet kind of resting on chairs when they could. Who cares? I WAS RIGHT UP THERE, JUST FEET AWAY FROM THE MIGHTY VAN HALEN!!!!!<br />
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Then you had the thing that joined these two music behemoths in the AA into one once a year for almost two weeks: The Red River Exhibition. All the games, rides, and music you could shake a stick at. At the Ex, you could walk into Winnipeg Arena, where booths of displays and vendors were kept, anytime all day long, not just the time period before a concert starts, and actually go through the doors and walk anywhere in the building FOR FREE!! What a novelty! And you could walk through the areas fans were normally barred from, the area the performers hung out in. That entrance in the middle of the building that the wrestlers walked out of on AWA wrestling cards that I mentioned last paragraph, I COULD WALK THROUGH!! Wow! The Stadium had the Ex's free concerts, and those are really my most memorable concerts I saw at the Stadium: Donny & Marie, Starship, The Monkees, Burton Cummings, Cheap Trick. At night the Ex was free after 11:00 p.m. (formally closed but everyone knew you can still walk through the gate and just not pay), and the combination of the darkness of the night, the Ex's rides and their lights, the warm-but-cooling-off night summer air, and the people made this the summer's most attractive and passionate environment to be in.<br />
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And parking was almost always free at the Polo Park lot. Polo Park never cared enough to stop AA parkers from parking on what was technically their lot. In later years, they tried for Winnipeg Jets games, but never for concerts or wrestling. So you could go to the Ex and park for free, unlike now. Are there any side streets or shopping mall parking lots where the Ex is now, past the Perimeter, where you can park for free? In fact, I have no idea if what I say above, where you could still get through the gates past 11:00 p.m. when they stopped charging for tickets, still applies at the Ex today in their new location. It might. But to find out, you have to pay for parking first in their lot. Then you find out the Ex really is closed and are out the money you paid for parking. Or maybe they don't let you even park, saying, "The Ex is closed for the night." So you've driven all that way for nothing. Not nice. Not good. Not cool. The Ex's new location stinks, pure and simple. (Back to the Ex at the AA: They did charge for parking at the Polo Park lot on Sunday afternoon, because they could. No Sunday shopping or all those restaurants like Earl's or Joey's back then, so you'd have no other reason to drive onto the lot. So I parked for free on St. James Street south of Portage for those Sunday afternoons, by where Olive Garden is now.)<br />
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And what of Polo Park, which still stands today? Well, does anyone remember when Polo Park was the only shopping mall in Winnipeg? There's magic right there. To those of us who grew up thinking of downtown as Winnipeg's shopping mecca, a far-off mouth-hushed-in-wonderous-amazement anomaly of an indoor enclosed shopping mall where you aren't outside between stores and subjected to the elements or the mundane, down-to-earth qualities of sidewalks, street signs and outdoor storefronts (all of which could be dirty) was ultra-sleek and shiny in comparison to begin with. When I was a kid in St. Vital, Polo Park was a place my mother and I had to transfer buses downtown to get to. Then later there was the even more far-off Unicity Fashion Square, by the Perimeter Highway, where you still transferred buses but the second bus ride was REALLY long. It all seemed exotic. And this was long before St. Vital Centre opened. But to add to that the fact Polo Park was right beside Winnipeg Arena? Electricity unparalleled. If you had the time to go through Polo Park before a concert, you could cut the buzz in the mall surrounding tonight's upcoming show with a knife. Especially in the record stores. The one drawback was attempting to buy albums by tonight's performers. What do you do with them? Who wants to lug them around the arena? If you took a car, you could leave them in the car only if it was winter. If it was summer, they'd warp. I used to think about those poor albums by tonight's artist that are left in the store unsold; The store and the mall are closing by the time the headline act hits the stage, and that act's albums have to stay and sit there, lonely, in the quiet, closed store. They can't be part of the action next door. Nowadays, of course, Polo Park is still there, but without the arena and stadium there, it's just another mall. And today, it's a mall that has been slowly eroding the spaces devoted to record stores, book/rock magazine stores, ice cream, and stationery stores in favor of clothes, clothes, and more clothes. But I digress.<br />
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The buzz before the show at Polo Park? Well, that was actually secondary. The biggest buzz was, of course, at the nearby restaurants. I mentioned Chi-Chi's. I have actually never eaten there, but walked in there once to look for someone. But certainly that was the place to go and to see and be seen before a concert or any arena event. But me, being a self-respecting jean-jacketed or black-leather-jacketed and long-haired hard rock fan back then, I went to McDonald's across St. James Street instead, where Future Shop and Old Navy are now. Again, electricity unparalleled. Everyone wearing band shirts bought from previous tours or Solar News or Dominion News downtown or through the mail from the ads in rock magazines. Guys playing air guitar. Denim, leather and hot chicks (in denim and leather) everywhere. Rock and roll ecstasy. THE place to hang out before and after the show. Long lineups don't matter when there's hot chicks in front of you to look at and maybe talk to, if they're actually there with no guy standing next to them. Is there anywhere like that close to MTS Centre? Is McDonald's at Cityplace still open before a concert or does that whole food court perhaps close at 6:00 p.m., perhaps dating back to when MTS Centre was Eatons? I guess there's Moxie's, but that's a real restaurant where you don't have the freedom to be on your own; you still have to wait for the server to bring you your check, wait for her to come back to accept payment, etc. Is that the price we pay for the mini-skirted-and-black-high-heels environment Moxie's at least provides?<br />
<br />
And now, mainly precipitated by Winnipeg Arena's closing and demolition and replacement by the downtown MTS Centre, the AA is now gone. All being replaced by retail, offices, and more general ho-hum everyday stuff. We can sit in our parked cars in the Marshall's parking lot, where Winnipeg Arena stood, and reminisce of Winnipeg Arena concerts and how our car is parked IN THE VERY SAME SPOT THE WINNIPEG ARENA STAGE WAS ON! THE SAME SPOT THAT ALL THOSE LEGENDARY PERFORMERS PLAYED MUSIC ON!!! We can go inside Marshall's and go to the menswear section - more like old men's wear section, but whatever - and say, "This spot was where Gagne & Brunzell beat Duncum & Lanza for the AWA tag team titles on July 7, 1977," or "This is where Chris Jericho won the WWE Musical Chairs Championship live on Monday Night Raw on July 5, 2004." But the magic is gone. The ONE element that still exists today is the parking lot at the back where I used to park for Winnipeg Arena concerts and wrestling; I still enter the Polo Park lot from Portage Avenue and make the trek to the back today, except now it's for the Silver City movie theatre that now stands where Chi-Chi's mexican restaurant used to. Silver City opened before Winnipeg Arena closed in 2004, so the timelines intersect. I still think I'm parking in "Winnipeg Arena parking" when I go to Silver City for a movie now.<br />
<br />
MTS Centre is downtown, Investors Group Stadium is in south Winnipeg, and the Red River Ex is in very extreme west Winnipeg. All at extreme ends from one another. All fine venues in and of themselves, but all with serious flaws contained in the experience of seeing shows there. (And I live in Osborne Village, right by downtown.) Some of that is written about here, but this blog's purpose is mainly be a tribute to, and celebrate the memory and nostalgia of, the AA, and to point out the uniqueness of all the elements of this area that had been huddled together, and how we had it so good in Winnipeg while it all lasted. And now it's over. And I thank my lucky stars I lived through it. Future generations will not.<br />
<br />
Concerts weren't $100 back then, either. I think I've only seen around ten or twelve shows at MTS Centre. Well, at least I can see today's shows for free on You Tube. Thanks, all you guys that do that with your cell phones! I appreciate it. Well, there's something that's changed that's actually good.Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-46620255030710346452012-12-29T13:53:00.000-08:002012-12-29T13:53:50.703-08:00Let's Do The Samoan Time Warp: My Idea For Back To The Future, Part 4 Robert Zemeckis, where are you?<br />
<br />
I have an idea for Back to the Future Part 4!<br />
<br />
In Part 4, Marty McFly has grown up, has unfortunately acquired Parkinson's disease (not funny, not supposed to be, like the Family Guy parodies, but necessary), and has a teen-aged son. Marty and his son visit Doc Brown, and the Doc tells them he has added a new feature to the DeLorean time machine that allows them to land somewhere else in time in any other spot in the world, not just the spot they left from.<br />
<br />
Okay, now read this condensed news item that was in the press after New Year's last year, at the start of 2012:<br />
<br />
"A hop across the international date line transported the South Pacific island nation of Samoa 24 hours into the future - making it the first in the world to ring in the new year. Samoans began celebrating.....at the stroke of midnight on Thursday, Dec. 29, when the country skipped over Friday and moved straight into 12:01 a.m. on Dec. 31. Samoa and neighbouring Tokelau lie near the date line that zigzags vertically through the Pacific Ocean, and both sets of islands decided to realign themselves this year from the Americas side of the line to the Asia side, to be more in tune with key trading partners."<br />
<br />
So back to our story: Marty's son thinks the time machine is really neat, but, with Marty and the Doc in the car, accidentally sets it to travel back in time to Samoa on.....you guessed it - December 30, 2011!!!!! A DAY THAT DOESN'T EXIST! Great Scott!!<br />
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What happens then? Do the three of them get sucked into some kind of epic vortex? Well, that's for Zemeckis and the writers to find out, I guess. But Robert, baby, if you're reading this, e-mail me at beauh@mts.net and I'll tell you where to send my cheque for coming up with the idea for the film. And if a film gets made like that and no one from the film sees this, well, you guys know who got the idea first, so.....LAWYER TIME!!! Well, once we determine if Zemeckis and his crew didn't come up with the idea themselves in the last year. It's taken me a year to get to this. If they didn't, then film or no film: bring on the cash. Then, once I have the cash, bring on the girls. It's party time. Evander Kane, eat your heart out. If no film gets made? Then at least all of you have gotten a lot of fun and enjoyment from reading this!<br />
Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-83307612997953192012012-09-23T13:49:00.000-07:002012-09-23T13:53:09.659-07:00Rock Of Ages stuffOkay, first let's get this out of the way - ROCK OF AGES IS THE GREATEST MOVIE OF ALL TIME!!! Well, actually, I'm not sure how it fares and compares with The Brady Bunch parody movies, The Blues Brothers, or the Back To The Future trilogy. As time goes on, will I think it's better than all of those, or will it just take its' own place among those films as "its' own thing," a film that, like those others, simply stands on its' own? I don't know. In fact, due to the Winnipeg Fringe Festival, I failed to see Rock Of Ages a second time in the theatre before it left the screens. But the movie's mixing of '80s hair metal power ballads and Broadway musical tugs right at my heartstrings, because for me it mixes the musical environment I grew up in as a kid with my mother's show-tune albums, the FM and vinyl record store rock environment I was introduced to as a '70s teen, and the environment that spawned, the '80s hair-band/cock-rock scene that was in full force when I did my TV show Hard Rock Heroes. And it mixes those worlds perfectly and effortlessly.<br />
<br />
So, with that, I tweeted a great deal about this movie. But comments like the ones above aren't suitable for Tweets - too long and can't adequately be shortened. So the stuff I ended up tweeting were my fun observations of the film's historical accuracy, which was mostly bang-on. And, by coincidence, in my last blog post, I talked about possibly reprinting Twitter comments here. So without further adieu, here are those comments, all collected and reprinted here. BUT: I actually had taken those comments previously and turned them into a writeup I had sent one of the Winnipeg media music writers. So it's actually that writeup that I will now pull apart to seperate ideas into their own paragraphs below. So that's why what's below doesn't really look like Tweets.<br />
<br />
So here we go:<br />
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"In the poster for this film, why is Alec Baldwin wearing a 1996 Kiss reunion t-shirt when Rock Of Ages is set in 1987? And that shirt would be purported to be a '70s one, too, or it better, 'cause in 1987 the last time Kiss had worn makeup and had both Ace and Peter in the band was in very early 1980." (Note: Baldwin, or anyone else, never actually wore that shirt in the film. Good.)<br />
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"In the Tower Records store, there was a Kiss Crazy Nights poster, and that album came out in September 1987, so the movie is obviously set in the fall. But why is 'More Than Words' by Extreme here, when that song came out in 1990? And funny how that's the only song that doesn't fit timewise. Is someone an Extreme fan?"<br />
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"The first time Stacee Jaxx is presented to us is a mixture of Gene's entrance and Paul's re-entrance, when the reporter finds him in his bedroom, in the home video Kiss Exposed, and Stacee's monkey is also stolen from Kiss Exposed."<br />
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"Ironically, Kiss Exposed came out in 1987. Maybe the picture is trying to be painted that monkeys were hip then."<br />
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"Oh, and Steven Tyler's monkey in that skit in the American Idol finale was stolen from Kiss Exposed, too. He should get that monkey to help him at Burger King."<br />
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"Teaching today's generation about records and used record store culture. Try the plotline about Sherrie's stolen records with a fucking IPod."<br />
Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-36639003711707251142012-03-24T14:29:00.004-07:002012-03-24T14:46:51.780-07:00Still here, peopleDon't worry, everyone, I haven't suddenly dropped off the face of the earth. I just kind of made a conscious decision after I did the last blog entry that I was so satisfied with what I wrote that I was going to leave it up as the last blog entry for a really long time. So it's been around nine months now, and I don't really have any ideas for a new blog, at least none that don't require a lot of time, which is in short supply these days. Add to that the fact that in November I went through some horrid audio-video computer problems that were mostly fixed before the end of 2011, but not fully fixed until two weeks ago. So that's why, for those of you who watch my You Tube videos, I haven't done a "Webcam 2" video yet. But that can now be green-lighted again. And I still use my MySpace blog as a secondary blog for secondary issues. I think the way I used to do The Beau Zone in the past (check the archives) is dead now due to lack of time, plus the fact the jokes I think of are now directed to my Twitter feed. Although I could reprint that stuff here, I suppose. I've just never thought of it. Maybe I'll consider it. But for now, this text you're reading is my free pass to make even more time pass to keep that last blog entry I did prominent on this page before I do a next real blog, and to direct you, if you haven't already, and especially if you're someone in the media who has power and influence in hiring, to check out that blog entry that is called "Toys In The Attic: The Aspirations And Regrets Of A Media Fan And Personality." It is directly below. TTYL, everyone, and don't drink the water in Mexico.Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-82825584314537947032011-06-06T01:44:00.000-07:002011-06-06T20:02:00.891-07:00Toys In The Attic: The Aspirations And Regrets Of A Media Fan And PersonalityI don't have a broadcasting degree.<br /><br />I sort-of took a broadcasting course, the old NIB one, and at night, too (you can roll your eyes now, people), but got so disgusted with the place I never came back after the last official class and never officially graduated.<br /><br />And the first part of that course was actually during the last few months of Hard Rock Heroes in 1993. <br /><br />So, on occasion, I find myself wondering for a second of any possible regrets I might have about not taking a full-time broadcasting/journalism course - a real one - at the time most people take such courses, which is in the years directly after high school.<br /><br />And the answer is always the same - no.<br /><br />How could I? The world was different back then.<br /><br />I was a teenager in the '70s. I graduated high school in 1980. On my show Hard Rock Heroes, I was like a Muchmusic VJ. In the '70s and early '80s, there were no such things as music video channels. There weren't even any specialty channels, as they're called in Canada, yet. (I prefer David Letterman's label "cable deal.") Winnipeg/Canadian TV was represented by three channels - affiliates of CBC and CTV and independent CKND - and "cable" was affiliates from North Dakota of U.S. networks CBS, NBC, and ABC. And that's it.<br /><br />People on TV were very stuffy and intellectual older men in suits like Ray Torgrud, save for the occasional attractive weather girl. Men I couldn't relate to. Men whose words that came out of their mouths still mostly went over my head (Torgrud again), even after two years of Mr. Keddie lectures from his Glenlawn Collegiate history classes.<br /><br />You would be hard-pressed to find anyone even wearing a pair of jeans of television back then, never mind anyone talking about Cheap Trick, Aerosmith, The Hangover (both the movie and real ones) McDonald's Big Macs, or anything that comes out of the mouths of anyone, including hosts, of today's daytime talk shows and reality shows. Even look at just the studio audience of the more women's-oriented shows today like the Marilyn Dennis show or The Talk and compare it with '70s versions of shows like that. The '70s version had an audience that looked like war-torn babas from the Ukraine who had never heard of facial expressions. Marilyn's studio audience is all rocked-up gals in jeans, who no doubt partied until 5:00 a.m. when they were teens in the '80s at alcohol-fueled house parties laced with Van Halen played louder than God when someone's parents were away.<br /><br />There certainly weren't any entertainment reporters back then, either. And that's about the only thing I would be cut out for in broadcasting. (I'm going to leave radio out of this essay, because I'd kind of be digressing if I discussed radio due to my long-time opinions about rock radio and all the great music they don't play that intertwines with this subject.)<br /><br />Not only that, but even today, I would be over my head when it came to news reporting. I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer when it comes to the goings-on of the federal, provincial, and civic governments, or the American government. Certainly not the economy. I understand the most basic things, and I know how the parliamentary system works, and how a party's seats won translates to who governs and what majority and minority governments are all about. But a lot of the contents of, say, Tom Brodbeck's Winnipeg Sun column, or the things Marty Gold used to rant about on The Great Canadian Talk Show (and still does on his blog) that involve the inner workings of government and the police are things I just don't have the mental resources to ever come up with, or even comment on, myself.<br /><br />So there was absolutely nothing that existed in the '70s and early '80s that would have made me aspire to being any kind of on-air personality.<br /><br />The course I took did do one thing to me, however. Throughout the course, the instructor (if I can use that term) used the word "broadcaster" a lot. Well, yeah, because we're supposed to be there to learn how to be broadcasters. But I didn't get that at first. That's why I started off the eighth paragraph above by saying "people on TV," 'cause I'm trying to paint a picture of me in the '70s there. See, with Hard Rock Heroes, I wanted to promote myself from being just an ordinary concert audience member. It frustrated me that I couldn't go hang out backstage and hobnob with all the celebrities and media types back there. The routine of buy a ticket, watch the show from your seat, maybe buy food and hang out in the concession area checking out girls, socialize with your friends, and leaving the show afterward had started to get old to me. Doesn't matter if I went with friends or by myself. So I thought that, of all us audience members, if I had a forum for it, I could be the guy who COULD go backstage to talk to the band, as long as I had a microphone in my hand and a cameraperson to record it. Then I could air it in my forum, which, as it turned out, manifested itself in the form of being my own TV show called Hard Rock Heroes. I became the guy from that show. But.....a broadcaster? That word never entered my mind. I never thought of the VJs on Muchmusic as broadcasters, either. They were like me: Hot dudes and babes on TV, wearing jeans and talking about music, and awkwardly finding ways around using rock fans' favorite swear words. I spent the Hard Rock Heroes years so wanting to be a Much VJ - sending in tapes, having an in-person interview with Much's Nancy Oliver. My idea of a "broadcaster" was still someone like Lloyd Robertson. Then later, I became interested in the power of television, and tried to use my power, if I had any, to promote local bands.<br /><br />But, fast forward to the present, and I have become more comfortable with the word "broadcaster." It's grown on me. I'm pushing 50 now, and, while I'm not your parents' 50, I'm way too old to be on Much now. But that's okay. Because, as I illustrated in the paragraph above where I talk about things like Marilyn Dennis' audience, the world has changed. '70s and '80s teens have grown up, but in a different fashion. They've taken their rock albums with them. The MTV/Much casual/rock music attitudes in which now everyone is an overgrown teenager, college degree in something or not, have swept North America. News departments at TV stations have entertainment departments and reporters and segments, and, beginning with Entertainment Tonight in 1981, there are now a slew of TV shows dedicated solely to entertainment reporting. And I love all of them. And I want to be on all of them. I'd love to be a Winnipeg ETalk correspondent for CTV, if there was such a thing. I'm a complete couch potato for those shows, but with the eyes of someone paying attention to who the reporters are and how they do their jobs and everything revolving around "if I was in their shoes in being given this assignment" when I'm watching one of their reports.<br /><br />So, yeah, I would feel like, if the job was the right one that I could perform, like an entertainment-oriented one, that I would certainly feel comfortable performing it, and calling myself a "broadcaster." If I were in jeans or a suit. And hopefully it's an awards-show type of suit, not the one Lloyd's wearing. <br /><br />Now the flip side: What I WAS doing in the years after high school.<br /><br />I actually cover this pretty well in my biography on my Hard Rock Heroes website. In a nutshell: Throughout grades 1 to 12, I pretty much had the same curfew. I did "break through" to see my first rock concerts - Alice Cooper, then Aerosmith/AC/DC - in 1978, but I basically had a sheltered life due to a parent who didn't know how to parent. Good thing I had friends to teach me about life back then. Then I got so busy with homework in grade 12 (all 300 courses) I just did homework all night, every night. I didn't even watch TV. I might spend 1.5 hours figuring out one math problem. Then, through a friend at school, I got a job at McDonald's on St. Anne's Road. The crowd there was totally different than my high school. My classmates were like the guys on The Big Bang Theory. My McDonald's co-workers were all rock and roll partiers and Judas Priest/AC/DC fans. All denim and leather. So were the girls, and they looked like Playboy centerfolds, too. (Too bad it was still the era of jeans, white socks, and white runners for girls, and not today's minidresses and black high heels, but I digress.) The people were different because my classmates were from St. Vital, and my McDonald's co-workers were mostly from Windsor Park and Southdale, the suburbs across the Seine River that I still today refer to as "the party capitals of Winnipeg." So began a good three years of what most people experience during their high school years but I experienced AFTER those years, the ROCK AND ROLL PARTYING YEARS. And there were a lot of parties during those years, including in the McDonald's crew room. In fact, those years and the Hard Rock Heroes years are tied in my mind as being the best years of my life.<br /><br />So it's kind of hard to regret not going to college - well, actually I did try twice, with other courses, but quit both times, and again, more details are in the "Beau's Biography" section of the Hard Rock Heroes website - when that would have taken the place of the best partying years of my life.<br /><br />I should acknowledge somewhere in here that, while MTV started in 1981, it didn't seem real as a career aspiration because 1) it was new, and 2) it was American. The odds are too overwhelming against coming up with the idea to do something like Hard Rock Heroes and doing that for three years to use it to springboard to being a VJ on an American music video network. No way in hell can a Canadian with what would still be seen as too-little experience become an MTV VJ. I don't think MTV can convince the U.S. government that they can't find, among 250 million U.S. citizens, someone to be a VJ, causing them to have to hire a Canadian like me. That's the way it works in getting a U.S. job, unless a particular field has shortages, like nursing. Plus we couldn't really see MTV on our Canadian TV screens. Red River College showed MTV in their lounge in 1981 via satellite, and fortunately, I had a friend then who attended that college, so I would drop him off and pick him up all the time, giving myself an hour either before or after to watch MTV in the lounge. So I did see original MTV VJs Nina Blackwood and Mark Goodman. Muchmusic started in 1984, but as Winnipeggers like me residing on the west side of the Red River (I moved from St. Vital to Osborne Village in 1984) that had cable company Videon back then know, Videon could not provide us with Much or TSN until September 1987. In fact, a popular hangout in the '80s for my crowd was the bar at the Marion Hotel, on the east side of the Red River, first because they presented on their huge TV screens in 1981 this new invention called rock videos, then later because they had either Much or TSN on their screens, even though it was just the pictures only due to the DJ music in the bar. I first saw Much VJ Erica Ehm do her thing on the Marion screens, and I remember when we were in the bar early one night, before the DJ started, and we could hear the TV sound, and I was fascinated watching her and hearing the sound of her voice for the first time. When we finally got Much in September 1987, I remember watching her in my living room and being thrilled that I could finally hear what she was saying on a regular basis.<br /><br />The point being that music video channels, although they started in the '80s, remained on the peripherals of our lives for most of the decade, not really ingraining themselves into our lives, or my life, until the last years of the decade. With the exception of the frustration of reading about the goings-on on MTV in U.S. rock magazines, especially the Headbangers Ball, and not being able to see any of it. (Hey, there's something I should look for on You Tube.)<br /><br />So here I sit, a former cable access Muchmusic-style-oriented TV show host, having bombarded the appropriate people in my city of Winnipeg with the appropriate materials - and yes, over the years I have done that - in hopes of parlaying my unique broadcasting experience into some kind of full-time paying gig, and receiving little real interest. Well, at least they know me. Both from that and, by now, all my internet stuff.<br /><br />I am a fan of Red River's CreComm, though. Saw their pamphlets in the early '80s, thought they were too intellectual for me back then or that the course was more for the print journalism or advertising industries, or to teach people how to be Ray Torgrud. Basically, in some form, those may have been a combination of truths and excuses and that I wasn't ready. Now, it seems closer to what I'm interested in, maybe partly because I've grown and matured as a person and can relate to the material more. It's also fun now, with the internet, perusing the blogs online of both the students and instructors and following what avenues students have gone on to. Which students? The ones I saw at one of their yearly Independent Professional Project (IPP) presentations that are open to the public, this one held at the Park Theatre. And heck, the way the world seems to be today, you can't just be a fan of media anymore - if you are, everyone tells you you should be in media, and/or in this course. I'd love to take the course. But I have to work to make a living. I can't work and take a full-time course at the same time. And if I were to take CreComm, I would not want to work anywhere, even part time. I would want to devote my entire life to that course and to the media.<br /><br />But the elephant in the room for me is - well, besides the fact that Red River College might not accept a 49-year old (this July) man into CreComm - that I don't know whether a course like CreComm, or the Academy Of Broadcasting course, will do any good for me. Maybe TV stations in Winnipeg just "don't want that Hard Rock Heroes guy" regardless of whether I have official broadcasting credentials or not. Maybe I've pigeonholed myself with my Hard Rock Heroes persona. If so, then taking those courses are just a waste of time. All I can do is speculate, because when there's no interest, you don't get anything in the mail as a response. Well, I did get a couple of responses from news directors, but they were short and didn't say much about what they thought about my personal broadcasting experience.<br /><br />If I won the lottery, then I could quit my job and take CreComm, even if it were just to entertain myself. I'm sure I would just love it. Maybe make some new friends. But that will never happen, because I don't buy lottery tickets.<br /><br />And that again brings me to: Do I have any regrets over how things have turned out up to this point? And I have to mull it over, think of all the things you have just read, and conclude yet again: "No." <br /><br />Was I born too soon? Maybe, but I loved growing up when I grew up, so I wouldn't change that, either. The Archies, The Partridge Family, The Brady Bunch when I was 7 to 10 years old. Kiss, Happy Days, Welcome Back Kotter, Aerosmith, disco, north Portage Avenue record stores when I was a tween, then a teen. No, man, I wouldn't change a thing.<br /><br />My being ahead of my time is just the way it turned out. <br /><br />And life isn't over yet.Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-26402634366633846612011-02-28T01:48:00.000-08:002011-02-28T02:22:27.090-08:00Dire Straits' "Money For Nothing" and BullyingHere are my thoughts on this whole Dire Straits "Money For Nothing" fiasco, where the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council ruled that the 1985 song should now be censored, with the offending word "faggot" removed from the song.<br /><br />And, as usual, my opinions are completely different from anyone else's, and don't reflect anything I've read anywhere so far.<br /><br />While I can totally understand the arguments against censorship or editing of this song, I don't mind if it's edited to take the word "faggot" out. (And I'm not gay.) Actually, I'd rather hear that word or the "N" word bleeped out of songs than the various sexual representations of coarse language like "fuck" or "cock." <br /><br />You see, there is an element out there that think that that song is actually celebrating the attitudes of the two retail appliance workers Mark Knopfler overheard and immortalized in song.<br /><br />I personally refer to that element in society as the "macho redneck caveman bullies (MRCB)."<br /><br />These are the guys who were bullies when they were 10 years old in 1972, and probably still are today. It's great that people are trying to do things about bullying in schools now, but what about the 10-year old 1972 bullies who are 40-something-year-old truck drivers and factory workers now? Do people think they're too far gone for help? That they can't deal with the potential verbal and physical violence from these MRCB if they tried to somehow corral their redneck behaviour and attitudes?<br /><br />When I read in the papers of today's bullies and what kind of things they bully people about, NONE of it matches what the MRCB of the '70s cared about and bullied people over.<br /><br />Basically, these guys want all males around their age to be exactly like them. You must be a sports fan, - preferably listing hockey fights as your favorite "sport" - you must drink beer very, very fast, you must work in the warehouse and DESPISE all so called "office people" when they are not standing there, you must wear a baseball cap and have a mustache, and you must judge music artists by how hard it is to play the guitars in their songs, which is why the favorite band of MRCB is Rush. (Wonder what the MRCB think of Maroon 5 or hip-hop music, or anything on Muchmusic's New.Music.Live.) The MRCB figure that if anyone can learn to play the instruments in a given song, then what good is the band that plays that song? Then you try to get the MRCBs to explain guitar playing, to explain what the difference between Rush and Kiss guitar playing is, and why and how Rush playing is more intricate, and instead of an intelligent answer, the MRCBs just become more and more upset, start yelling and screaming, and don't answer your question. I had to wait 20 years to read the answer in a guitar magazine, and it was actually so intellectual of an answer that I couldn't totally understand it myself, since I'm not a guitar player.<br /><br />If you don't fit in with all of the above atributes, like for example, if it takes you an hour to drink a beer like I used to be (I can drink one in half an hour now), then you are branded a "faggot" by the MRCB and you are bullied. Period. I think of the song "If You Don't Start Drinking, I'm Gonna Leave" by George Thorogood. That's the only song that comes close to acknowledging the existance of MRCBs, and, wouldn't you know it, it's a song that supports them. Except around here, it should be called, "If You Don't Start Drinking, YOU'RE Gonna Leave." That's more what I'm accustomed to. If you and the MRCB are 10 years old in 1972, you are bullied on the schoolyard at recess, until a teacher shows up. Then the bully changes his attitude and the teacher wonders what the problem is. If you and the MRCB are 45 years old in 2007, you are bullied in the workplace, until an "office person" shows up. Then the bully changes his attitude and the "office person" wonders what the problem is. Oh, and the bully is the warehouse manager, too. And his boss, the CEO is a bully, too, but I don't want to digress here. Let's get back to the Dire Straits song.<br /><br />The argument of the MRCB is that Mark Knopfler and Dire Straits know what "good music" is (which is basically anything played on CITI FM) and so, the appliance workers Knopfler overheard inspired him to write "Money For Nothing" to point out, through quoting those workers, how awful and terrible artists like Michael Jackson and Prince are, which includes calling them faggots. Doesn't matter that the MRCB are completely and totally off the mark. They'll just say to anyone reading this who will try to tell them that Knopfler wrote that song to expose how ignorant those workers are, "How do you know? Do you know Dire Straits personally?" The MRCB don't know them personally, either, of course, but you can't convince them that what they look upon as normal behaviour by people who they think are "their own kind" is anything but. Oh, and don't think I've neglected an artist's look, either: in order for an artist to gain the respect of the MRCB, they must look like the way Boston or Foreigner look on the covers of their first albums. They can't wear anything or have hairstyles that would cause the MRCB to NOT WANT TO BE SEEN WITH THEM IN PUBLIC, i.e., anything that would brand them as "faggots." (1970s FM radio fans beating up AM radio fans could be another image the mind conjures up here.)<br /><br />And, because there are so many MRCBs still out there, that's why this issue involving this song from 1985 has hit a nerve with the Canadian public. (The issue would be more intense only if the song were from 1975 or 1978 rather than 1985.)<br /><br />Do something about bullies in high school today, those hip-hop-or-weird-band-loving gang members? Sure, why not? Everyone supports that. But try to take one small step against the MRCBs that have never been attacked before - "hey, that's US!" and all hell breaks loose.<br /><br />The MRCBs have it coming, and have had it coming for 40 years now. I don't like being called a faggot, even though I'm not gay. <br /><br />So if the CBSC wants that word censored, they'll get no argument from me. If it isn't censored, well, hopefully what the press writes about the real reasons Knopfler wrote the song are correct, and so that's fine with me, too. Either way, hopefully this will finally open up discussion on finally doing something about bullying from the MRCBs. <br /><br />Now if we can only get the uncensored version of "Patron Tequila" by The Paradiso Girls played on Hot 103, heh, heh.....Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-73596797042097874282010-10-09T15:46:00.000-07:002010-10-09T16:04:31.378-07:00The Evolution of Winnipeg's Bar Circuit From the Late '70s to TodayI had a phone conversation recently with a friend of mine who's in a cover band. The conversation went typically. We've covered this ground before. He just doesn't understand how the music business in Winnipeg has changed since the late '70s/early '80s in the area of bars and clubs and what they offer for live music nowadays, and how it got to this point. He still thinks the bands in this city of note that are waiting to be discovered by record companies are the cover bands that play at places like Mirrors, The Palomino Club, and Silverado's. He is clueless of the bands that play at the Pyramid, the Albert, or The Zoo. The bands that exhibit today's current "DIY" (Do-It-Yourself") approach. He just dismisses that scene as "alternative music that appeals to very few people." He can't figure out why the days don't exist anymore when a cover band that plays a few of their own originals can go into a bar for a week, and, like the band Click, "pack the place on a Tuesday night." Well, lack of money due to the economy, more things to spend money on nowadays, like computers and DVDs, and more need for a college education that requires homework and more sleep the night before instead of going to bars would be reasons for a starter. I don't know if this guy lives under a rock during the day when he's not performing or what, but I can't figure out how he can know nothing about his current music business surroundings. He's single. Does he simply not exist when he's not on stage? Does he just sit there and stare at blank walls all day? Doesn't he read the papers, Uptown, or watch TV? Doesn't he check out the bar listings? Doesn't he TALK to people?<br /><br />Anyway, here's an e-mail I sent him after our conversation that covers a few more things. I thought that after writing all this, I would like to do something more about it. So I put it here on The Beau Zone. It's slightly edited. The subject matter of how the bar circuit has changed from, say, 1978 to now is actually quite fascinating, and it's something you never read about in Winnipeg media. You always read about Burton Cummings' and Randy Bachman's era in the '60s, but what about after that? What about the '70s, the '80s, and the '90s? It's a subject that never gets discussed. And I can't even fully discuss it. I've never worked for the booking agencies or the bars involved. Maybe I'll alert Winnipeg club writers about this blog, and they can be inspired to write about this subject. That would be great. So here's the e-mail I sent my friend. Hope you enjoy it.<br /><br />"Another slant on what we were talking about on the phone: <br /><br />"What started as the DIY approach for all-original bands has evolved into the next level, and I think initially the dividing lines between music genres is what allowed DIY to grow, but nowadays, with generation changes, it pretty much applies to all genres. Especially when party rock or straight ahead rock isn't being done anymore except by country bands or rare bands like Nickelback that are evolving from their former status as being post-grunge bands. <br /><br />"Winnipeg's best-known hard rock bands are Dreadnaut and Xplicit. What someone like Dreadnaut does, is that, since it is an all-original band, and when they were in their infancy they were probably the first or second band on a night of unknown bands maybe once a month or something, is that they take their now-headlining gigs and make something special out of them. Independent bands all have their own CDs out that they sell at their merch table with t-shirts, as well as Music Trader and Into The Music, and online via CD Baby using Paypal. They put up MySpace pages with their music that fans can hear for free on their computers but not download. They poster their gig everywhere, and it becomes an event, because it's just one date. Today's fans of metal, punk, folk, or singer-songwriters, who seek out gigs they're interested in at venues (they're more called venues now, not even bars) would probably think of the old "bar circuit" of the late '70s as something very odd, and perhaps boring, too. They might wonder, 'What kind of excitement does an artist offer when they're playing every day, all week, three sets a night, at a bar, then all over again next week at a different bar, and with 70% covers, 30% originals?' These people, like the band members, probably have day jobs that are DIY, too, like running their own businesses, maybe using the internet, or if they are employees, then it's something seasonal, so that they can easily procure time to tour (because a lot of these artists tour to other cities, too). Personally, having lived as a fan with both systems, I find neither one better than the other. They're just different, that's all. I will say that the old '70s bar circuit is more geared towards the 'employee' mentality; If you're an employee at a factory or something, then you've got plenty of opportunities to see someone. Similarly, a band member feels like an employee himself, doing nightly music shifts and perhaps making a living at doing covers. <br /><br />"That bar circuit scene was kind of over by the early '80s, although it sort of wasn't, because the notable strong exceptions were Night Moves & The Diamond Club, along with Norma Jeans. This era produced Jenerator, The Shivers, Playground X, Howling Now, etc., who all did originals. However, the independent music scene had started and was alive and well with Monuments Galore, etc., and grew from there. There had always been a distrust towards CITI FM, too, as CITI wanted to be the self-appointed gatekeepers of what was good rock/hard rock and what wasn't. Either you were frustrated at the bands and albums they didn't play, or you were sheep who dismissed those bands and albums as not being any good "because CITI doesn't play them." <br /><br />"'70s rock had morphed into '80s hair-band rock. Then the bottom fell out entirely around '93 when grunge and alternative took hold and Night Moves/Diamond Club became country music clubs. (People say grunge and alternative started earlier, like around '91, but things took longer to catch on in Canada, and record companies here were still signing regular rock bands like Big House and Dead Beat Honeymooners, which certainly fueled my TV show Hard Rock Heroes.) CITI FM ultimately couldn't deal with this and went classic rock. So-called 'regular hard rock' was dead and all forms of music that were left went DIY. Then came computers, Windows, Microsoft Word, and the internet, which took DIY to a whole new level. Meanwhile, in the late '90s, pop came back, and in a very, very SEXY, and female, way. Rap and hip-hop had been brewing slowly since the '80s, really. The dance clubs became a zenith. That's where we are today, with envelope-pushing girl pop, rap and hip-hop dominating the charts, along with the occasional rock band thrown in here and there for contrast. All songs are full of swearing now, and have to have the offending words and phrases removed for radio and video. And don't forget all those artists that came from American Idol! In this environment, for whatever does remain for a 'bar circuit,' which probably only still exists due to MLCC regulations concerning cabarets, is now strictly a 'cover band bar circuit' (you tell ME when/if bar owners and/or the agencies told you 'no originals at all') in which the songs a cover band plays must be hits that complement the DJ in the places that have cover bands and that keep people dancing. Nostalgia for old hits has helped today's cover bands, too. <br /><br />"I said on the phone that if a band could sneak in an original that fits in with what you just read there would be no market for it. I'm going to go back on that a bit. It's just something that has been untapped here in Winnipeg. Pop music out of Winnipeg? (And that's basically what it would be - Pop music.) Not much of a precedent there. The Shivers were pop-rock and they made a decent headway, but that band existed when we were still in the Diamond Club/Night Moves/Norma Jeans era, and they imploded when Randy Reibling, who arguably WAS The Shivers, left. (I'm talking about the original Shivers from the early '90s, not the cover-band version with Randy and a bunch of guys from later in the decade - by then, FOR SURE Randy himself was The Shivers.) I was reading about Enjoy Your Pumas, a name I've seen gigging around town, this weekend in Stylus, and they are apparently a pop-dance act. And I had forgotten to talk about Ash Koley! I LOVE Ash Koley. She's a Winnipeg pop artist who just moved to Toronto not so long ago. Her music is like '80s new wave meets Abba meets Disney. Very catchy, and Hot 103 has played it. One of her current songs is now a Manitoba Lotteries commercial! Check out her music and You Tube embedded videos at http://www.myspace.com/ashkoley. <br /><br />"This doesn't fit anywhere in this, but I feel it's worth mentioning: The rise of DJ culture. DJs like to feel that their scratching and mixing and mashups are an art form now so this gives to the rise of DJs as artists. Look at the listings for the Pyramid, the Albert, and the Academy, and you'll see they are half DJ nights now. Even The Zoo is trying DJs on occasional nights. And certainly Ozzy's has had great success with the Ready Mix DJs on Thursday nights ever since The Collective/Die Maschine closed and became American Apparel/Hifi Club. <br /><br />"Certainly, the changes have been jarring for any musician used to making a living weekly in the bars, who might have gotten into it originally in order to make original music, but who got lured in, as they got older, by the easy lifestyle playing covers brings when compared to the uncertain DIY ethic, particularly if you like to play a style of music that DIY doesn't jibe with, although in 2010, that may have changed, too. If you can find some way to pay the bills, would you consider doing a CD of original music with a band and looking for DIY gigs to promote it? Actually, at The Zoo, I don't know what it used to be, but now it's partially a pay-to-play deal: You pay The Zoo $500.00, and the night is yours. You charge whatever you want for cover and you keep 100% of it. The Zoo keeps 100% of beverage sales. Any money made or lost is yours. You are responsible for your own publicity (postering, advertising, etc.). Full pay-to-play, like in L.A., means if only 10 people show up, no one's buying drinks and the bar somehow charges you a hefty sum and you never get to play there again. I don't know how that compares with The Zoo's situation. That's where you get L.A. band members passing out flyers on the Strip themselves, pleading people walking down the street to go to their gig. More info on what The Zoo does at http://www.myspace.com/osbornevillageinnofficial. <br /><br />"Marc Labossiere's situation is puzzling. I believe he plays all '90s rock covers by bands like 3 Doors Down nowadays, and somehow he's allowed to do that. I haven't seen him in a long time, but when I did, the dance floor didn't clear for him. I don't believe he does his originals from his CDs. He probably could. He probably did the best job anyone on the bar circuit could who WASN'T willing to get off of it and go tour in other cities for peanuts without radio or video play. In other words, he became a big WINNIPEG star with his CDs, but never wanted to go to the next level. Ya gotta get off that bar circuit, Marc, dude! It takes money to make money. Maybe bands like Kick Axe got lucky with offers and Marc didn't. I have no idea. But then, Kick Axe was still years earlier than the club environments Marc has played in. I just thought I should say something special about him. <br /><br />"And that's all I have for you now. I'll probably save this writeup and change around a few words and use it for The Beau Zone." <br /><br />And, as you have now read, that's exactly what I have done!<br /><br />Your thoughts, people?Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-636294077641052192010-07-25T22:57:00.000-07:002010-07-25T23:36:02.337-07:00Getting "Shit"-Faced On MTV Canada And MuchmusicI love it when you get that feeling of accomplishment, especially when it's unexpected. All I did was write an e-mail.<br /><br />I have noticed the last few months, on MTV Canada, they can say the word "shit" now, just like on Muchmusic. Well, I should hope so, now that both channels are now owned by the same company, CTV. Actually, I thought the reverse would happen, that after CTV's takeover of CHUM (where they had to divest themselves of CITY-TV, now owned by Rogers), CTV would can Muchmusic personalities from saying "shit." But no, CTV is continuing to let that word go and has now extended the practice to their MTV channel that CTV had started prior to the CHUM takeover.<br /><br />Could that be as a result of my self-explanatory e-mail to MTV Canada's feedback address this past January?<br /><br />That e-mail, through the magic of copy and paste, goes like this:<br /><br />"Regarding your 'Top Ten Holy Shit Moments' show you aired at Christmas: Isn't it ironic that, while on another show similiar to this one you also aired around Christmas, you appear to be taking a potshot at Muchmusic and the kind of young audience they cater to nowadays, on the Top Ten Holy Shit Moments show on MTV, every time you actually say the word 'shit,' it's bleeped out, while Muchmusic has been letting that word air for years and years now. I recall a Much On Demand where Leah Miller appeared to be deliberately saying it all through the hour, so I was wondering if she had just found out that day that Much lets it air unbleeped. But that practice must go back, gosh, about 10 years by now.<br /><br />"And, to add further irony, Much and MTV are both owned by CTV now. Do the CTV honchos know that 'shit' airs on Much, the target audience channel of ages 10-25, but is bleeped on MTV, the target audience channel of college age and higher?<br /><br />"Maybe the Much people don't want to bring that up to their new CTV bosses, because that could be the way they find that out, and then they'll can that practice. Personally, I hope it goes the other way and you get to say 'shit' unbleeped. I would love it if you could find a way to air all your shows that air, say, late at night, completely language uncensored. Only bleep stuff during the day. I realize why that can't happen, though."<br /><br />I hit "send" and.....voila! There's Daryn Jones & Nicole saying "shit" on MTV Live. Not bad.<br /><br />This, of course, represents another baby-step in the repositioning of all cuss words to just being slang words. Another one is the movies CTV airs overnight on weekends that are completely uncensored, too, if they can get an uncensored cut. The envelope is getting pushed, baby.<br /><br />And, as a dude with the rock and roll attitude that used to host a hard rock TV show, the fact that I could be held a little bit partially responsible for this evolution is, well, yeah, something to be proud of. Something to be FUCKING proud of, dude! YEAH!<br /><br />(And, hey, that also means Much and MTV Canada can say the entire title of William Shatner's new sitcom "Shit My Dad Says" on air! The subject of this blog post coupled with this sitcom's title could add another baby-step to all this, too, as the days march on.)Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-76555302090966166372010-05-17T00:06:00.000-07:002010-05-17T00:28:05.498-07:00My thoughts on "The Runaways"Okay, I guess it's time. My first regular Blogspot post! I'm so excited.....<br /><br />My favorite movie review site is Pajiba. As a fan of the band The Runaways, I thought I'd copy and paste here my thoughts on the recent Runaways movie that I wrote in the comments section of their review page on the film (Note: It starts out with me responding to an ill-informed fan named Protoguy who claimed both the Lita Ford and Jackie Fox characters weren't in the film):<br /><br />"As a huge Runaways fan, Protoguy: Lita Ford IS in the film. Bassist Jackie Fox is not, probably because she was the one causing legal trouble and she's now a lawyer herself, so the producers probably thought she would be the only real threat here, so they created a fictional bassist with no lines to replace her. Brian: Once the group was solidified with the lineup that appeared on their albums, there were really only two bass players: Jackie Fox on the first two albums and Vickie Blue on the second two albums. Cherie Currie left the band after the second album, at the same time Jackie Fox did. Which brings me to my thoughts on this film: Most of the film is really good, but the last bit sucks. As you noted, Cherie's biography is the source material. But her bio is not the same as The Runaways' bio. This movie makes it seem as if The Runaways ended when she left the band. NO! Thank God at the end there is print for us to read that told us the truth: That after Cherie left, Joan Jett continued with the band for two more years, whereby she sang all the songs. Why didn't Joan continue the rest of the story of the band with the producers? In fact, their first album without Cherie (third overall), Waitin' For The Night, I bought at a record store in either '77 or '78 whose land today is occupied by the mall that houses the very theatre where I saw this movie! It also must be a head-scratcher to movie-goers not familiar with the band: If this is a Runaways bio, why do they seem to be concentrating mostly on the lead singer's life? With only a bit about the guitarist's life and almost nothing about the other members? Now, I'm a Runaways fan, so I didn't mind all the stuff with Cherie and her family, and I wasn't thrilled at first with how the film only concentrates on Cherie and Joan, but there may not have been room for five different points of view, and I'm happy with the screen time the Sandy West and Lita Ford characters do have. In fact, Lita and Joan do get into an argument near the end. It does suck there is no Jackie Fox. But where was their No. 2 most well-known song (after 'Cherry Bomb'), 'Queens Of Noise?' I was looking forward to seeing the girls perform that song. It is listed in the credits, so.....was there a snippet of the song so small I missed it? Someone help me on that one. If the song really wasn't in the movie, shame on the producers for that. It would have been cool if the Kim Fowley character made mention of the two songwriting credits he got on Kiss' Destroyer during The Runaways' Cherie Currie years, too."<br /><br />For the references I made above that I didn't name because only Winnipeggers would understand them: Of course, The Runaways played at the Globe Cinema, which is in Portage Place, and which stands on the very same piece of land the record store The Wherehouse used to be in the '70s, and where I bought the Waitin' For The Night album. So I guess it's apropos that the film played at the Globe! I return to the scene of the crime 32 years later!Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-9514775372213188842010-02-21T23:05:00.000-08:002010-02-22T00:12:04.150-08:00The Beau Zone Now On Blogspot!<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">As Triple H of Degeneration X would bellow, "ARE YOU READY?"<br /><br />Good, because this is the official relaunch and rechristening of THE BEAU ZONE in its' new home on Blogspot.<br /><br />The Beau Zone, for those who aren't aware, is where you'll find all my controversial opinions on everything that aren't usually reflected in regular media, Winnipeg or otherwise, along with some cool pop culture jokes. Although, I admit, lately, there's been more of those pop culture jokes than anything else. That's because there hasn't been time for me to assimilate the longer opinion pieces in with the funny stuff. You see, when The Beau Zone was formerly a page of my website on my old TV show, Hard Rock Heroes (</span><a href="http://www.hardrockheroes.com/"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">http://www.hardrockheroes.com</span></a><a href="http://www.hardrockheroes.com/"></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">), I had a page to fill and change every two months. Well, two months became six, and as I write this, I haven't done a new Beau Zone in a year. No time. The material is certainly there; most of what's on The Beau Zone is just copy and paste from stuff I write for other purposes. So what I have decided to do, for a variety of reasons, is to take The Beau Zone off of the Hard Rock Heroes site and move it to this Blogspot page, where I have the luxury of doing one post at a time. I don't have to fill up a whole page at a time anymore. Additionally, the archives are all here; I don't have to keep them elsewhere anymore, like on that MySpace page that will now function as just my personal MySpace page. (Meaning it took me a few months to redo the archives, i.e., to copy and paste them onto this Blogspot site.) So lick it up, people, and if you want to act out this symbolic christening by chucking a bottle of beer at the wall and smashing it all over the place, you're completely welcome to it. Hey, what's a party without smashed beer bottles all over the floor? And look at all the items on the left you can click on that take you to the entries in the archives; isn't that cool? That's one of the things about Blogspot I feel more comfortable with now. So I'll leave you with that for now; I want this writeup to be front and center for a while so I'm still going to hold off on any new entries for at least a month. I'll probably still do the pro wrestling entries in a conglomeration of several items, like the way I used to end off each Beau Zone on the Hard Rock Heroes site with the pro wrestling comments. They'll just appear whenever now, that's all. So call or e-mail all of your friends, friends with benefits, co-workers, co-workers with benefits, lovers, enemies, teachers, family, parole officers, and anyone else, and tell them THE BEAU ZONE IS NOW ON BLOGSPOT and that IT'S READY TO ROCK!</span>Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-15426718279155601812010-01-30T15:19:00.001-08:002010-01-30T15:26:04.642-08:00Pro Wrestling CommentsORIGINALLY POSTED ON THE TWELFTH EDITION OF "THE BEAU ZONE" ON THE HARD ROCK HEROES WEBSITE FROM NOVEMBER 2008 TO FEBRUARY 2010.<br /><br />It looks like Vickie Guerrero on Smackdown has made something of the catch phrase, "EXCUSE ME!" Don Callis as Cyrus in the original ECW tried, but he didn't make his entrance often enough before the TNN show was pulled. <br /><br />Speaking of Don Callis, the act of The Brian Kendrick and Ezeikel on Smackdown seems to be someone's ripoff of Don Callis as The Natural when he had Bad News Allen as his bodyguard in Tony Condello's IWA Hardcore, which was the last thing Allen did before retiring, and the last thing Callis did as The Natural before heading off to WWE as The Jackyl. Allen dressed up in that same white outfit Ezeikel wears.<br /><br />And speaking of Vickie, when she punished referee Charles Robinson for his conduct, I guess she was remembering when J.J. Dillon replaced Ric Flair with him as acting president of WCW on Nitro from Fargo, North Dakota in April 1999 (I was there) after Roddy Piper had Flair committed to the insane asylum the previous week in Gainesville, Florida. (Remember Robinson and Flair talking on split-screen?)<br /><br />And speaking of Flair, on Raw, when he and Chris Jericho were going to go outside to fight, I was wondering if Jericho might get locked out again like he did on Nitro when he had his security team, including Ralphus, and he locked himself out of the building and couldn't get back in. In the ring, Wrath was watching all this on the screen and figured if Jericho couldn't go to him, he'd go to Jericho. So he left the ring, went backstage, went outside, and they had their match outside. (FUN FACT: The bar First Avenue in Minneapolis is where Prince filmed Purple Rain. Years later, they built the Target Center kitty-corner from First Avenue. When Nitro was at Target Center, there was another match where Jericho and his opponent (forgot who) wrestled outside into the street and I could see First Avenue behind them. Cool!) <br /><br />I heard a comment from an audience member on MTV Live on MTV Canada when they were talking about colleges and universities: "Well, you know the saying, if you can hold a fork, you can go to York." I chuckled as I remembered Trish Stratus went to York. <br /><br />WWE has released Stevie Richards, but here's something I had written about him before he was released that no one ever says: The reason WWE fans don't react to Stevie Richards is because they don't get why Steven Richards of the Right To Censor looks like that. Now, I don't remember myself, but what was the angle to end the Right To Censor? I have a feeling there wasn't one. So WWE just dropped it and the leader, Steven Richards, grows his hair again and inexplicably slowly morphs into what original-ECW fans know as Stevie Richards. Without any promos. And so the fans are confused. Ever since the Right To Censor ended, WWE fans just don't know what to make of this man. Can he even be salvaged in WWE? It's amazing he's even still there.<br /><br />Regarding the May 9 and May 16, 2008 Smackdowns, where they had the winner of the battle royal become the new World Heavyweight Champion: Why couldn't Teddy Long (in Vickie Guerrero's absence) or Michael Cole/Mick Foley bring up the following points: 1) If Edge was medically cleared to wrestle during the battle royal, couldn't they have brought up the fact that he was supposed to wrestle and defeat someone in a qualifying match first? If there is no time for such a match because the battle royal is taking place, that's not fair, it's in favor of Edge, and it's something the announcers could easily have brought up as heat on Edge. Instead, no one brought that point up. 2) And if Edge is going to run out into that battle royal, how is it that he wins just by spearing Batista off the ring apron? I thought that the way you eliminate anyone in a battle royal is by throwing them over the top rope. Edge did not throw Batista over the top rope. He just pushed him from the ring apron onto the floor. Batista should have gotten back in the ring. He was not eliminated. Now, WWE could have still done all this and have the announcers deliberately not bring it up until after the match, which in this case would be on next week's show, but the problem with doing all this is that, although it puts heat on Edge, it portrays the WWE's referees that worked that battle royal as a bunch of incompetents.Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-48510810967751816612010-01-30T15:17:00.000-08:002010-01-30T15:19:03.093-08:00Paris Hilton/Lindsay Lohan StuffORIGINALLY POSTED ON THE TWELFTH EDITION OF "THE BEAU ZONE" ON THE HARD ROCK HEROES WEBSITE FROM NOVEMBER 2008 TO FEBRUARY 2010.<br /><br />Okay, so Lindsay Lohan was in rehab, right? And she was there the first time when Paris Hilton was released from prison, right? So Paris goes on Larry King Live on CNN and Larry asks her about Lindsay and Britney and she gives reserved answers, then he asks her something about rehab and she says, "I have no friends in rehab." OOOOOHH!!! So Lindsay's not her friend? I guess "frenemy" IS the correct word! I'm surprised the media didn't jump all over this!Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-20824493972100182202010-01-30T15:16:00.000-08:002010-01-30T15:17:49.426-08:00Avril Lavigne/Verizon Wireless StuffORIGINALLY POSTED ON THE TWELFTH EDITION OF "THE BEAU ZONE" ON THE HARD ROCK HEROES WEBSITE FROM NOVEMBER 2008 TO FEBRUARY 2010.<br /><br />Those new Verizon Wireless phones where you point the phone at a playing song and the phone identifies it really work! I heard the new Avril Lavigne song "Girlfriend" and pointed my phone at it and the display read "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend" by The Rubinoos!Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-43317797609079607352010-01-30T15:14:00.000-08:002010-01-30T15:16:20.086-08:00More Short SnappersORIGINALLY POSTED ON THE TWELFTH EDITION OF "THE BEAU ZONE" ON THE HARD ROCK HEROES WEBSITE FROM NOVEMBER 2008 TO FEBRUARY 2010.<br /><br />How about some MORE short old stuff? Both these two are about 2007 award shows.....Belly is performing at the Muchmusic Video Awards this year? Wonder if he'll ".....feel the pressure....." Hey, maybe BFFs Hilary Duff and Leah Miller can be the ".....females doing what they want to do.....".....At the 2007 MTV Movie Awards, when they did the gag with Sarah Silverman and Jessica Biel almost kissing, they should have spliced in the shot of Justin Timberlake looking intently as he was looking at the Britney/Madonna kiss at the VMAs that other year.Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6129208453655206742.post-16271421106346774712010-01-30T15:13:00.000-08:002010-01-30T15:14:32.181-08:00Kiss StuffORIGINALLY POSTED ON THE TWELFTH EDITION OF "THE BEAU ZONE" ON THE HARD ROCK HEROES WEBSITE FROM NOVEMBER 2008 TO FEBRUARY 2010.<br /><br />While we're on the subject of Kiss, Gene Simmons once said he'd like to brand the air we breathe as "Kiss Air" so that every time we'd take a breath, we'd owe him money. I think this puts Gene in a quandry: "Kiss Air" would make more money than "Gene Simmons Air" but for "Kiss Air" Gene would have to give 50% of the profits to Paul Stanley.Beau Hajavitchhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14189635019680160710noreply@blogger.com0