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Maybe it's because I love roller coasters so much; even though the one at the Seattle Center is thrilling despite having been built for children, I'm absolutely furious over the rumor that the Experience Music Project's Funk Blast will be removed so the site can be used for another concert space. For those who have missed the Funk Blast when visiting the EMP (and many do, because it's situated in an oddly out-of-the-way area), it's a fake roller coaster that uses a darkened room, hydraulic lifts, and forced air to make riders feel like they're zooming through the ghettos (or jhettos, as the fabulous Dina Martina would say) of New York, Chicago, and other neighborhoods that gave birth to famous funk stars. Part stupid (due to the narrators) and part sheer fun for the roller-coaster-deprived, the Funk Blast has been my favorite part of the damn EMP, aside from the shows and the historic-guitars room (neither of which you can ride, I might add). EMP spokesperson Paige Prill's official comment was, "We've not yet made any kind of announcement regarding Funk Blast, and at this point it's just a rumor." Seriously, when people asked me what I'd do if I won a zillion dollars in the lottery, my immediate answer was always that I'd have a Funk Blast (sans narrators) installed in my house. And yes, I am a full-fledged dork.
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The first Rock Against Suicide concert will be held in Portland this weekend--December 14, to be exact, at Satyricon. DIJ, Stars of Track and Field, and Substance will play this inaugural event; the $10 donation/admission price will go toward a documentary on teen suicide in America. Rock Against Suicide (whose website has that squinched-up "Isn't that Dave Grohl?" image, just like on the music trivia game at Graceland) was conceptualized in 1994 after Kurt Cobain blew his troubled head off, and activated last summer. An Olympia benefit concert is in the works--and maybe a Seattle concert as well. Hopefully some bands you or I have heard of will get involved.
