Dr. Frank is the main force behind the Mr. T Experience, an old Berkeley based pop-punk band that still seems to be semi-alive and kicking, and he's one of my favorite pop-and-politics bloggers. To be honest, I've never been a huge fan of the MTX, but the blog kicks ass. Two recent highlights:
1) From the latest salvo in Frank's running commentary on why the Bay Area is the most Wonderful/Horrible Place on Earth:
I love living here. The weather's great. I like the tolerance for eccentricity (though I often wish people would just get on with being all tolerant and everything without having to make such a big deal about how great it is that they're so tolerant, and how you don't find such top-notch tolerance just anywhere, and how you haven't really experienced true, cream-of-the-crop tolerance till you've seen it in action amongst the best people in the Greatest Place on Earth.) I probably couldn't survive anywhere else. But there is a drawback, and that is that everyone is so self-impressed. The narcissism in the air is so thick and plentiful that it's sometimes hard to breathe normally.
2) Frank skewers the humorless dolts at Alternative Tentacles whose knickers are in a twist over the possibility that a former member of the Dead Kennedys may have sold the rights to the band's cover version of "Viva Las Vegas" to American Idol. (Got all that?) Tongue firmly in cheek, Frank writes:
Needless to say, it is absolutely vital to protect the legacy of the Dead Kennedys' joke version of a novelty song owned by Warner Brothers. This is particularly true when the co-opting is being done by Amerikkkan Idle, a popular show that the better sort of person rightly holds in contempt, and on a network like Fox, which will, of course, be the first network up against the wall when the Revolution comes.
The man is fighting the good fight and entertaining in the process.