(above : one of NYC’s most beloved icons/public figures. And on the left, Earl “The Pearl” Monroe)

Jeff Jensen, one half of the terrorist telephonic duo that brought you the monumental comedy recording, ‘Just Farr A Laff (Vol’s 1 & 2)‘, will be making a rare stand-up appearance tomorrow night at Brooklyn’s Bruar Falls. You know the old saying, “how do you get to Bruar Falls?” To tell the truth, I’ve never heard that saying, but here’s a google map link.

(photo by Connie Tsang)

Fucked Up are the winners of Canada’s Polaris Music Prize. Awarded annually to the best Canadian musical artist, there is only a single artist chosen and it is an highly prestigious award.

Liisa Ladouceur, who oversees the voting for Polaris, talked about the intensity of the process.

“We ask the jury to vote regardless of genre and they truly did,” stated Liisa Ladouceur, Representative of the jury. “Members of the jury believed that the Fucked Up’s Chemistry Of Common Life was not only the best hardcore album of the year, not only the best Canadian album of the year, but was the best album of the year in the world – period.”

The 2009 11-member gala Grand Jury are: Bryan Acker (Herohill), Brendan Murphy (Hour), Stuart Derdeyn (Vancouver Province), Mary Dickie (Elle), Brad Frenette (National Post), Nicholas Jennings (freelance journalist), Robert Mersereau (CBC), Mia Parang (Musique Plus), Ben Rayner (Toronto Star), Brad Wheeler (The Globe And Mail) and Lisa Wilton (Calgary Sun).

For their performance on the show, Fucked Up were joined by Final Fantasy and Lullabye Arkestra. Not to mention Mrs. Falco, better known as Jonah’s mom (she plays the flute intro that leads off The Chemistry Of Common Life). You can view their Polaris performance of “Son The Father” on the Much Music site if you visit this link and then expand the “MOST RECENT VIDEO” tab.

Don’t forget, Fucked Up will be doing a full-album performance of Chemistry at the Brooklyn Masonic Temple on November 5… with additional musicians to truly bring the multiple layers of density and allusiveness that make up that album. Get ticketing info here.

Buy ChemCom.

If you grew up in New England, it’s very difficult to stomach what passes for chowder in the rest of the country. Thick white concoctions packed with cornstarch and a few unidentifable clams, or worse, tomatoes. True chowder is buttery and only barely thickened by the crumbling of the potatoes. Milk or at most, light cream, are the dairy ingredients, and the flavor is based on salt pork and the freshest seafood you can buy.

Top seafood chowder can be had at the Maine Diner in Wells, ME – a day trip from Boston. This chowder was based on their recipe, with some hints from John Thorne’s Down East Chowder (since reprinted in the sublime Serious Pig. Since good salt pork is impossible to find in New York (if anyone has a source, please post), we used nitrate-free bacon from Vermont, blanched to remove as much of the smoke flavor as possible. Potatoes are ideally from northern Maine, Aroostook County, but if you can’t find them, use small yellow potatoes such as creamers. They need to be firm, not crumbly like Idaho or russet potatoes. Seafood was the picked meat from a whole lobster (discarding the tomalley), rock shrimp, medium scallops and cherrystone clams. None of this was ideal except for the excellent scallops – you want a lobster right out of the Penobscot, tiny coldwater Maine shrimp, and steamers or soft-shell clams rather than cherrystones.

The lobster bodies were simmered in water to make a stock, and the other seafood was cooked in a strainer in the same water. Meanwhile the blanched bacon was rendered and fried. One diced onion is added to the bacon frypan along with a half stick of butter, and fried until translucent. The potatoes were chopped into half-inch cubes and boiled until cooked but still firm. Lobster shells continued to simmer until close to suppertime, then the broth strained off along with the grit at the bottom, and reduced a bit. 2 cups milk and 2 cups light cream were then added slowly. The translucent onions, butter and blanched bacon are added to the milky broth, and simmered – the seafood goes in at the last minute, along with salt to taste. One eater preferred some fresh ground pepper in his bowl. Common crackers should be sprinkled on top, but since these no longer seem to be made, we used non-salted oyster crackers instead. The result was sublime, as you can see from the photos.

Hey, laugh at this guy all you want, but at least he was out there plugging vinyl at the height of the CD revolution. Video link swiped from Boing Boing.

It’s Dutch nieuwe haring season, raw fillets of herring from the first catches of the season. I guess you’re supposed to drag it through the raw onions and then dip it into your mouth holding it by the tail, but I preferred it the way I got it at various shacks around Amsterdam: on bread and butter with the raw onions on top. It’s meltingly delicious, and does not shy away from being raw fish. This is not sushi. It’s very robust. Fantastic with beer, probably even better with vodka or champagne. For those of you in New York, Russ & Daughters still has it, flown in fresh from Holland. Get it now – it won’t last long.

With their “Young Con Anthem”, they’ve made me nostalgic for M.C. Bud Bundy.  (video link taken from Boing Boing)

video link courtesy Stuart Braithwaite.  On the (Scary) Super Fan scale, it seems Dave Wills must relinquish his crown.

It would be an exaggeration to claim most of my non-Matador related posts for the Matablog are culled from that awesome treasure trove of metallic press releases, Blabbermouth.net. Just as it would be the height of hyperbole to say I visit said site 5, 6, maybe 7 times a day. Even so, the ‘Mouth provides a daily glimpse into an alternate musical universal where somewhere on this planet (quite possibly in Eastern Europe), news of Rudy Sarzo’s advances in digital animation are eagerly absorbed.

Today, Blabbermouth informs us that L.A. Guns vocalist* Phil Lewis has the lead role in “Witchmaster General”, a motion picture hopefully described as a “supernatural thriller”.

Lewis plays Dr. Gorgon, a charming but sinister witchdoctor who uses his evil powers — as well as his close personal relationship with Satan — to run a sort of “murder-for-hire” business. A tough-as-nails cop (Martino) and the county coroner (Bud Stafford of “Grave Danger”) are hot on his trail, but are no match for the power he possesses or the evil he unleashes upon them.

“The film is a nice mix of great old-fashioned haunted house horror and all the sex, violence, and dark humor we’ve come to expect these days,” says filmmaker Jim Haggerty of his fourth feature film. “It’s kind of like an old Vincent Price movie on acid.”

As a longtime fan of L.A. GUNS, Haggerty is extremely delighted to have the opportunity to work with one of his musical heroes. “I have always been such a fan of Phil in L.A. GUNS,” he says. “He was — and really still is — such an exciting performer with such great charisma and talent on top of an amazing voice. He really was the right man for the job and it was an honor and a pleasure to work with him on this — I’m already writing the sequel!”

(* – I should stress that neither I nor Matador Records is taking sides in the dispute over the ownership of the L.A. Guns name.  Los Angeles has the greatest copyright / entertainment attorneys in the world and we fully believe in letting them do what they do best).