NEW YORK — “Flawed Logic,” the sophomore album from Philadelphia’s American Babies, is the perfect soundtrack for a cross-country summer road trip. In fact, Tom Hamilton (the frontman and driving force behind the band, also known for his work with the electro-rock outfit Brothers Past), calls the record a “collection of mental snapshots” from his time spent observing events around the country. Fans of Brothers Past might raise an eyebrow at Hamilton’s newer material, which draws heavily from folk, country and general Americana influences, but strong songwriting is still at the heart of Hamilton’s work, regardless of genre.

The singer recently took a break from rehearsals to chat with Blast about the new record, the inspiration for his songwriting, and his decision to break away from electronic music and form American Babies in 2007.

BLAST: Who are your main musical influences, both for American Babies and for Brothers Past?

TOM HAMILTON: God, it’s a fucking lengthy list. I definitely don’t separate them. I feel like you can hear my influences in either one. The obvious ones, The Beatles, The Dead, Dylan, stuff like that. Radiohead, huge influence. Stereolab, they have a record called “Dots and Loops” that redefined my entire idea of music, like the late ‘90s. Low, they put out a record, “The Great Destroyer” in like ’05, I think. (That was) another one that was just like, I heard this record and it shuffled the papers around in my head and kind of made me redefine what was possible in music. Broken Social Scene’s first record flipped me around. A few years ago, I got really into Motown, and that’s kind of where I am now, as far as this newest Babies record. Listening to a lot of Motown and Stacks records, stuff like that. That stuff just absolutely destroys me. Old Marvin Gaye and Otis Redding. You just can’t beat it.

For me, the thing with music, it’s not what you do. It’s how you do it. And I feel like the bands that I listen to, that I really like, what they’re doing, the style of music, really has nothing to do with where my pleasure comes from. It’s the fact that there is a sincerity in every note played and sung. Like Springsteen. It’s so genuine and so sincere. These people don’t do these things because it’ll make them money and because they have to. They do it because they have to, primally. Like, it’s an animalistic thing. They need to express these things. They need to get it out and connect with people. And that’s the common thread in all those bands that I named that I like. It’s all very sincere music. That’s what I try to do, no matter if it’s electronic music or folk music or blues or whatever. It’s about being sincere and genuine and urgent.

BLAST: Would you say “Flawed Logic” has a unifying theme? What events inspired the songs?

TH: I started making this thing, and everything was fucked up and everybody I knew was fucked up. The Wall Street shit, and there’s fuckin’ 80 wars going on. My friends are unemployed. My brother is on his way to getting deployed and going to Afghanistan. I had other friends that had to go to Iraq. Until that point, everything I always wrote about was, you know, chicks and love. You know, standard things you can write songs about. But when I was getting this record together, all these things, all these unavoidable things, I just couldn’t turn a blind eye to it. And I had to talk about it. I had to say something.

It was a really awkward situation because I’d never been really topical in my songwriting, you know, that much. Because personally, I hate self-righteous pricks. I hate when you turn on CNN and Jeaneane Garafolo’s on there talking about the war. It’s like, we’re entertainers. I feel like there is a line there. For me, it was a very touchy thing. I was like, wow. I have all these feelings, and there’s a feeling of urgency to talk about it, but I have no idea how to do it without being heavy-handed, without sounding like just somebody ridiculous, like Bono talking about AIDS or something. So, it was a huge challenge, and scary for me kind of. Being that far away from my comfort zone. I could have easily just written another record about my last girlfriend, you know?

So, sitting back and finding my voice was like the whole thing. Just talking to people and observing like, you know, how my brother’s family was dealing with his thing with the military, talking with my friends who lost their jobs or lost all their friggin’ money and how they’re dealing with it, and just seeing how it all goes. My friends who are married, how is it affecting them? When I was on the road I would talk to people all over the country. Just, how are all these things affecting all these people? I just basically took mental Polaroids and each one of the songs on the record, they all came from one of those mental snapshots.

BLAST: How does your approach to songwriting differ with this band?

TH: Wow, that’s a good question. I don’t know if it actually differs. (With Brothers Past) there were two songwriters. I wrote a majority of (the songs), but the keyboard player, Tom McKee, also wrote some stuff. I guess there was more collaboration in the Brothers Past thing. But as far as just like personally, the songwriting, it was never that much different. Even with the Brothers Past stuff, it was like, I would write the song on acoustic guitar or piano or something, and then I would have to dress it up in all of this other stuff. Which I feel like sometimes can get in the way of the song.

With the Babies stuff, it’s much more of a challenge. Because with Brothers Past,, there were times where, if a song kind of wasn’t totally happening, I could just, like, throw in a cool synthesizer line or something. I could throw in ear candy to kind of make up for a lack of something in the song. If a song isn’t really happening and isn’t like, really grooving, you can just throw a 404 beat under it and people just like it because it makes them move. There’s plenty of bands out there that make not that great songs and just put a dance beat under it, and people love it because there’s a visceral reaction to it. They don’t notice that you’re not saying anything in the song or that the song isn’t that great. All they know is that their ass is shaking. And that’s kind of cheating.

In American Babies, I don’t have that option. It’s kind of like, it’s just standard rock and roll. There’s no hiding behind anything. If I don’t really like this song, there’s nothing I can do to hide that. I have to just write it better or throw it out. So it kind of keeps me more honest.

BLAST: So you think it’s easier to make electronic music, even though there are more components to the songs?

TH: With the way that these programs are today, it’s exponentially easier. If you’re a producer and you are making your tracks, you’re actually recording the drums and you’re playing all the instruments and there’s original thought in there, I think it’s awesome. But more so than not, a kid gets a MacBook Pro and a copy of the program Ableton and you can buy samples. You can download samples. It’s all other people’s work that you’re just taking and, like, putting together. It’s the difference between, like, buying a puzzle that is the Mona Lisa or getting a canvas and painting the goddamn thing yourself. One of those takes an amazing amount of skill and talent and passion, and one of those things just takes the ability to fucking connect the pieces.

BLAST: What role did music play in your life growing up?

TH: It’s just always been around. My mom plays the piano and the cello. There was always music involved in my house. So, from a pretty young age, I was captivated by it. Whether (my parents) were listening to vinyl all the time, or the fact that my dad had, like, a local band, guys his age that just liked to hang out and play music.

BLAST: What was the first album that you fell in love with?

TH: My dad was a huge Deadhead, way into the Grateful Dead, which in turn made me also way into them. My dad gave me a cassette of this Grateful Dead show. It’s from Red Rocks, Colorado in 1978. Still, to this day, it’s one of my favorite things in the world. So that was the first thing that was, like, mine. And I listened to the shit out of it. I was like, this is awesome. To this day, I can listen to it. I know every note of every solo and whatever. But an actual record would be … I was really young, probably like three or four, and I loved Eric Clapton’s “Just One Night.” It’s a live record he put out, the late ‘70s, early ‘80s. I had a toy record player but it played real records. And I can vividly remember yelling at my mom, saying I wanted the cow record. Because the record label’s logo was a cow. … That was my shit, man. I loved that. That was a great, great, great album, and I listened to it nonstop when I was very, very young.

BLAST: When did you first start playing music?

TH: I started playing drums when I was about 5. My dad was a drummer and just kind of all-around rock musician guy. He played drums and bass and guitar and stuff like that. And he got my older brother playing drums when he was about 6 or so. And then, you know, me being the little guy, whatever my older brother was doing, I wanted to do, obviously. Since I was old enough to basically hold the sticks, I was like, I want to do that, because my brother was doing that. So I started playing drums when I was 6 and I took that pretty seriously until I was, I’d say, 12 or 13. And then I started playing guitar when I was about 10 or 11.

BLAST: What prompted your change in musical styles, from electronic music with Brothers Past to more roots rock with American Babies?

TH: I grew up on the roots stuff. I grew up listening to Johnny Cash and Merle Haggard and obviously The Beatles and all that stuff. Rock and roll in general is like a mentality. … I mean, it’s a reaction to something. When I got into the electronic stuff, it was new and it was exciting and it was a different thing. And I was like, wow, this is great. And then I guess, around 2006, 2007, it became kind of abundantly clear that any dude with a laptop and a synthesizer can make this stuff. It became so over-saturated and easy to do. The innovation was out of it, the excitement. It didn’t seem genuine to me. It didn’t seem honest. It didn’t seem cutting edge. And for me, that was the whole allure, was trying to bring songwriting and electronic music together. It just seemed like it got very just watered down, kind of.

So I went back and focused more on the song. I got very lost in (electronic music with) dressing songs up in production, with bleeps and boops and drum machines and weird things. The main focus should be the song, and it was a reaction to where I was at the time. I was just, like, so engulfed in all this electronic stuff and I was like, you know what? I want to strip it down. I want it to be about the song. You can’t hide behind anything if you’re just recording songs. There’s no production that can make a song great. It’s like, oh no. If the tune’s not there, it’s not there, and that’s kind of it.

BLAST: How did your bandmates in Brothers Past react?

TH: Originally, the idea was for that band to be playing this stuff. We put out an electro pop record and people really liked it and it got great reviews and it was selling really well and we were doing really well for ourselves. And I was like, hey, man, I think it’d be funny if the next record we put out, we make it like “Led Zeppelin III.” … The first half of that record is, like, punishing rock and roll. The second half of the record is all acoustic. And I was like, let’s put out like a “Zeppelin III” type of record next, to kind of show the extremes of what we’re doing. Like, hey, yeah, we do electronic music and stuff like that, but we can also really just craft a song. I wanted to make a record that was like, Side A, the most intense electronic music possible, and Side B, the exact opposite of that, which is just like stripped-down acoustic songs. And the guys didn’t really think that was a great idea and I was basically told, hey, man, you want to play that kind of music, you should start another band. So I did.

BLAST: How did you come up with the band name?

TH: I started writing these tunes, these more acoustic songs, with the idea of it being a part of my other band. And when I started getting into the whole thing, I started writing this song, and it was called “American Babies.” And it took me forever to write this song. I don’t know why, but it fought me pretty hard the whole way through. I had this grandiose idea of what the song was supposed to be. And when I was planning the recording sessions and all this stuff … I wanted to get all my friends around that I knew to come in and play these songs. The idea for the song “American Babies” was, there was a middle section of it that is this big, like, cacophony of sound. And it was basically like the kitchen sink song to me. I just wanted to get everybody that played on any part of the record … which was a pretty large number of people … everybody had to play something in this section of the song. It just kind of clicked for me. I was like halfway through the record and I was like, what do I even call this band? That song, it was symbolic to me of what this project was going to be. And I was like, well, I’ll name it after the song. American Babies. That sounds good.

BLAST: Do you think you’ll ever go back to electronic stuff?

TH: Brothers Past still plays here and there, for sure. We’re mildly active. And I mean, I do enjoy that stuff, the electronic music. When I do it now, I do it less frequently than before, so it’s fun for me. I don’t get wrapped up into the whole scene and stuff and get frustrated. … My passion is songwriting, and the Babies, I feel, are the purest form of my voice that I’ve had in my career. And I’m very excited about it.

American Babies are touring throughout summer 2011. For tour dates, visit americanbabies.net.

"The Art of the Steal," takes a look at the battle over one of the most impressive and valuable collections of art in the world. Valued between $25-30 billion, The Barnes Collection, currently housed in the Barnes Foundation outside of Philadelphia, has been long fought over.

Despite Albert Barnes’ explicit instructions left in his will detailing his desire to keep the paintings at the Barnes Foundation in Merion Pennsylvania, the city of Philadelphia, backed by a powerful group of allies including the Pew Charitable Trust, has taken steps to move the collection to a new facility in downtown Philadelphia.

The film takes a detailed look at how a desire for tourism dollars has led to the dismantling of one of the most unique art museums in the world as well as a man’s vision for a unique art experience.

Blast got a chance to sit down with the film’s director, Don Argott. We talked with him about greed, money and the Barnes Collection.

BLAST: When did you first encounter the Barnes Collection?

DON ARGOTT: Lennie Fienberg (the film’s executive producer) approached us with the idea of doing the film. I didn’t know anything about the Barnes Foundation up until that point. Lennie took classes there 20 years ago and he lived in the area. And if you live there, just like in Boston, you hear rumblings about the Gardner Museum; it’s one of those local stories that has been around forever. Lennie had the foresight to figure out this was a really big story and no one was telling it. Then I read John Anderson’s book called Art Held Hostage which recounts the history of the Barnes Foundation and the circus that ensued in the 90′s and kind of ends before the idea was to move it. It’s a great book; people should check it out if they want to learn more about the history of it. The film picks up where John’s book leaves off.

BLAST: Watching the film you see how much the former students value the education they got there. What about the education inspires that loyalty?

DA: It is really intimate, really comprehensive. I never took classes there but I don’t think you have to, to appreciate what that place is. It’s not dissimilar to the Gardner in that it’s this small, anti-art museum experience. That’s really what it is. I can’t for the life of me understand why the city of Philadelphia and the region is so committed to destroying this when they should be doing the exact opposite. Why can’t we have the art museum on the parkway and then have this thoughtful antithesis of the art museum experience at the Barnes Foundation. Why isn’t there room for both?

BLAST: It seems like a completely different experience, particularly comparing it to typical art museums.

DA: The whole thing is a work of art. It is different than an art museum. I don’t want to be anti-art museum, but most people who have gone to art museums know it is a pretty sterile environment. You see the painting with the placard that tells you everything you need to know and then you are on to the next thing. The Barnes challenges all that. You go in there and it is a true art experience. It is not just "The Card Players" hanging with the other Cezanne’s. Everything is arranged in such a unique way. Why they would want to dismantle that just doesn’t make any sense to me. The idea [is] that they can’t make it work, where it is proven in the movie that it was never their intention to make it work.

BLAST: Yeah the building and the arboretum are works of art themselves, like you said, and it doesn’t seem like that is being taken into account.

DA: How could it? You see where they are putting it on the parkway. It’s a swath of land. Even if they put gardens in there it will be the difference between a city garden and a suburban garden where there is actually an expanse of horticulture around you.

Blast: Do people in Philadelphia remember Albert Barnes? That there was an actual guy behind this incredibly valuable collection?


DA: The turning point for us was when we got the footage of Barnes. That was an amazing find for us. It was literally under someone’s bed. No one even knew what was on it until we got the film transferred and we were like "Oh my god, it’s Albert Barnes." He was not a heavily photographed or documented guy, and these are actual home movies that we have. The idea of really seeing him as a living human being is more compelling than most people realize, because for so long Barnes has been a name on a building — The Barnes Foundation. But that name doesn’t mean anything. There is only one photograph — it’s not even a photograph, but a reproduction of a painting — hanging in The Barnes Foundation. For all accounts, the Barnes does nothing to bring him back to life or show that he was this real guy. I think it is easier to discount someone’s wishes when you don’t think much about them. Seeing him as a living human being, it is different. You see he was a real guy. To me, this is his story. It’s not my story or my opinion. I think it is the film that Barnes would have made if he were alive. It is a pretty cool thing to have that responsibility.

BLAST: It is really easy to forget that the names on these collections were actual people and that the works they chose to buy represent them in such a personal way.

DA: That is exactly it. There are supposed to be checks and balances for all these things. Frankly, the Barnes trustees, the people who run the foundation — that’s their responsibility. It is not an outside group’s responsibility to make sure the Barnes is maintained as an amazing cultural institution. It is the people who are running it, and the people in place now have the exact opposite idea of what they should be doing with the art versus what the donor asked them to do. That is their responsibility, to make sure his wishes are kept. And they should be ashamed for what they are doing. There is a way to make it work; they’re just not interested in figuring out how to do that. They have moved on. They are all about turning it into something else now. It’s not about preserving what they should be preserving.

BLAST: And the fact that the value of the collection is completely due to Barnes’ incredible eye for the best artwork.

DA: That was important to illustrate. Oh, I get it, these paintings are worth millions and millions of dollars; that is why this is such a big deal. That is why the idea of moving it has more at stake. You see the other side and what they see. They don’t see a Van Gogh; they see a $10 million painting. That is what it has become. They see the paintings hanging in the Barnes as a series of dollar signs held captive away from the tourism community. It is this untapped resource to them that they can’t keep their hands off. It is almost like they can’t help themselves

BLAST: When you can advertise that you have an art collection worth $30 billion it has to be appealing.

DA: They can advertise that now and still be making all this tourism money because, the last time I checked, there is no Merion International Airport. People are going to come in to Philadelphia and not just see the Barnes Foundation. If they are interested in art they are going to go to the Philadelphia Museum of Art and to the Rodin Museum. If they want history they will go to the Benjamin Franklin Institute. There are amazing cultural institutions in Philadelphia and that’s not even mentioning the history. You can go see the Liberty Bell or Independence Hall. There is a ton to do. The idea that it all has to be in a 20-block radius because you don’t want to inconvenience the tourists by going out five miles into the suburbs and experience something unique is so ignorant. It’s disgusting.

BLAST: Before Richard Glanton took over as President, was there this big push for people to get more access?

DA: I think, to Richard’s credit, or discredit — whichever way you want to look at it — it was his idea was to put this thing on the map. He said as much and he did. He put it on the map in a pretty big way. The problem is the way that he put it on the map didn’t have this farsightedness of all the ramifications that would cause. I think, again, any part of this story, if cooler heads had gotten together and said “How can we figure this out? Where is the middle road?” things could have been different. But that never happened. From that point forward it became about something entirely different. Like everything else in our culture, we start arguing about the things that are not important and not about the things that are. So we are talking about this issue and this issue when we should be talking about how we can make this work without playing the blame game. We need to shift the argument back to what it is really about.

Even now with the film out, the people at The Barnes Foundation and Pew Charitable Trust who have commented are trying to discredit us as filmmakers because of our stance. They are doing everything but telling anybody what is false in the movie. But they will keep it up, hoping by beating the drum about how the film is filled with baseless facts, it will stick without them having to back up what they are saying. It’s all about not having the real discussion. I think that’s what is cool about the movie, because it asks more questions than it answers, and that is a good starting point. As long as the dialogue is talking about things that are really important.

BLAST: And you gave Bernard Watson (President of the Barnes Foundation) and Rebecca Remmel (President and CEO of Pew) the chance to counter the other arguments. That they declined speaks volumes, I think.

DA: You have to ask yourself, “Why wouldn’t they want to talk?” When you pull up Pew’s FAQ page about the Barnes Foundation, the last question is about why they didn’t participate in the film. And their answer was that we were going to be a biased film and they didn’t want to take part. They have gone on to say, because they have so much integrity for the truth and facts, they didn’t feel like it would be worthwhile. But isn’t that statement the whole reason they should set the record straight? It would be like no Democrat wanting to go on Fox News because they know they have a contrary position. That is a sure-fire way to make sure we never get anywhere — by not talking to the other side.

We didn’t have an agenda going into it. We would have still asked the hard questions; we still would have showed what we showed, but maybe there would have been a more compelling answer that would have challenged the viewer to consider their side. Instead, they chose not to. I feel like they are acting like they chose not to participate because they knew we were this nefarious [group] that was trying to discredit them. The truth, is they didn’t think anything of us. They didn’t think they needed to answer to us because they didn’t think we were anything. It wasn’t until we premiered at the Toronto Film Festival that their ears perked up and they were like, "Oh shit." And then we got distribution and it was even worse. Now they are up against the wall and they are trying to save face.

BLAST: Was there a challenge for access throughout?

DA: Only when we tried to get in touch with Barnes and Pew and we just got flat out rejections. We contacted the Barnes so many times throughout this. We almost begged them to be apart of it. I obviously wanted to shoot inside the gallery; that’s why I really wanted their participation…early on, but then throughout I kept telling them that people were saying some pretty nasty things, you should defend yourself. They said we don’t even want to talk about the opposition because if we acknowledge there is an opposition then we are playing right into the idea that this is a worthwhile dialogue to have and we don’t think it is. The courts permitted us to move forward, so we are. Then I told them to come onscreen and say that. That would be more effective than putting a graphic up that said they denied comment.

BLAST: It is so ironic that the people who are supposed to be representing Albert Barnes won’t come on and talk about Albert Barnes.

DA: Thanks for picking up on that.

BLAST: The Barnes Foundation is supposed to represent his vision and Watson wont even come on to talk about it.

DA: Now the film is representing his vision and the foundation that is supposed to be, is doing the exact opposite and that is the grand irony of the whole thing.

BLAST: Going back to Richard Glanton — he was such an interesting interview and you have to give him credit for coming on and being so open. I was curious did he express any regrets for the moves he made?

DA: Like you said Richard is an interesting guy and I gave anyone who came on the record and spoke a lot of credit. I gave Governor Rendell a lot of credit. I give them all a lot of credit for coming on and saying, "Yeah, let’s talk about this and let’s have a real discussion about this." Rendell wasn’t trying to hide anything. He told us the facts. It just so happens that the facts support the other side’s claims, the idea there was this plan set in motion a long time ago. I think Glanton had been kind of painted and portrayed as a bad guy in the press for a long time, and for good reason, no question. But we were giving him a forum to speak and he spoke candidly about it and I think the film shows that. Say what you will about Richard Glanton but at least he did kind of bring the Barnes out of the dark ages — once again, depending how you look at it, that [it] was a good or bad thing.

BLAST: Have they explained how the new building will help with the money problems the Barnes Institution has?

DA: We didn’t put it in the film because we couldn’t get a definitive number but the foundation runs at a deficit about $1.5 to 2 million a year. That means they have to make up $2 million in revenue to sustain themselves. It seems like a pretty big extreme to combat that by building a $200-400 million building and then figure out how to sustain that. The problem is all the other cultural institutions in Philadelphia are really strained right now. They aren’t doing well. This isn’t an example of putting a shopping mall in an area desperate for more shopping. People aren’t pouring into these institutions like they used to. The idea of putting something else on the parkway and that it will help seems wrong. I see it as a bigger strain. You are going to have yet another cultural institution that is going to need significant funding to sustain itself. To combat this very small problem, they are making an even bigger one. I haven’t seen the plans for how much the new building is going to cost because I don’t think they even know. First it was $100 million, now it’s $200 million. They haven’t even started pouring concrete in the hole and they are already $100 million off from your first estimate. I’m not an accountant, but that is off by a lot before you are even done. That should be causing a lot of red flags to go up.

And how much is it going to cost to sustain itself? How much revenue do you expect to bring in every year? What happens when the luster wears off and the tourism numbers drop because it isn’t new anymore? What is the plan?

BLAST: I thought it was funny that John Street (former mayor of Philadelphia) said the Barnes would generate revenue to match three Super Bowls "without the beer." Interesting way to put it.

DA: Yeah. We didn’t show it in the film, but later in the press conference a reporter asked him how much it was going to cost and he said "Oh, I know you people, I’ll say a number and then you’ll hold me to it, I don’t know." He doesn’t know how much it will cost but here you are all excited about it. I don’t know anywhere else in the world, except politics, where you can get away with that kind of ignorance and arrogance. I know I cant as a filmmaker. When a producer asks me how much a film is going to cost, I can’t say, "Lets just get started on it and figure it out as we go." If that isn’t a recipe for disaster, I don’t know what is.

BLAST: Another interesting idea that several people expressed in the film was how this isn’t the way Philadelphia should try to establish itself. It’s like they are trying to steal or manufacture culture.

DA: Philadelphia has — probably Boston too — this inferiority complex because we want to be something we are not. Instead of embracing what we are, it’s always about getting better at this or that. No city is going to be New York City. We don’t have to be New York or Washington or Los Angeles. It’s like an identity crisis. But we are already good enough. We have all this history and culture, let’s just be that; let’s promote that.

I shot that sign in front of the Ritz Carlton that says "Philadelphia- America’s Next Great City." What does that mean? Why do we have to be the next great anything? Philadelphia is a great city. I love living there. I have been there for 15 years. I grew up right outside New York, but I chose Philadelphia because of what it is, not what it wanted to be. It’s this idea that we are always falling short. To them this is something that means we won’t fall short now. We are going to have a world-class art institution. But we already do — its called the Philadelphia Museum of Art. That is a world-class art museum. People around the world recognize it as a world-class thing. Why do we need to bring something in to compliment that? We already have that. It’s called the Barnes Foundation and it is five miles outside the city. It’s a 10-minute car ride, 15 in traffic.

BLAST: And a collection that has been in place since 1922 is more impressive than a brand new museum. The Barnes is already a part of the city’s history.


DA: It is beyond counterintuitive.

BLAST: Perhaps the scariest part of the film was how the state allotted $107 million in the budget for the new facility and no can say who put it in. How is there no check or accountability?

DA: It’s terrifying. These budget bills are as thick as novels, and how many more of the little Barnes-type things are in there that we don’t know about? The mayor of Philadelphia announced yesterday that because the city is in such dire financial distress, they are going to start charging $300 a year for trash removal. There is always money for these other things, like the new Barnes building, that don’t benefit us, but they hide behind the idea that they are. They have already used $30 million of taxpayer money for the new building. That is a lot of money. Especially when you are now trying to charge me for my trash removal. That pisses me off. Enough is enough. Can’t we go back to the drawing board? When a family is struggling, they look and say we are going to have to scale back on the entertainment or the going out to dinner and then you figure out how to make it work. But within city government or government in general, there is always all this money and they never look at it because it is untouchable somehow. Instead they see, how can we squeeze more money out of citizens to make it work. Isn’t it time that somebody should look at the numbers and say hey, is there another way here besides charging the residents $300 a year to take out their trash?

BLAST: And you show these public hearings in the film about the Barnes, but in at least this case, it seems that the deals get done long before the process even started.

DA: It’s disingenuous. It’s a dog and pony show.

BLAST: Have you seen the plans for the new building? How does it look?

DA: It’s a big, modern, ugly-looking building. I mean, it looks fine for a new building. But for the Barnes Foundation, it just doesn’t work. I think the architects are stuck between a rock and hard place. The whole idea of the move is so guilt-ridden. The idea that they are going to move but keep it the same is ridiculous. Or that they are going to hang the paintings the way Barnes intended for them to be, but the rooms are going to be bigger. You are already destroying it. Just finish destroying it. The idea that they are trying to do it in the name of Barnes is more insulting and disingenuous than anything else.

College student Nicholas George, of Montgomery County, Penn., sued the federal government yesterday for detaining him at Philadelphia’s airport, according to the Washington Post. George claimed that three Transportation Security Administration officers, two Philadelphia police officers and two FBI agents violated his constitutional rights to free speech and freedom from unreasonable seizure.

According to CNN, the 22-year-old student claims he was wrongly detained for almost five hours last summer, on August 29, after an airport screener found his Arabic-English flash cards. The flash cards had an English word on one side and the corresponding Arabic word on the other. Of about 200 flash cards, about 10 had words such as “bomb” and “terrorist,” George stated. “They asked me why I had those words. I told them honestly because I had been trying to read Arabic news media, especially Al-Jazeera, and these are words that come up when you read the news about the Middle East,” George said. George also had a book entitled “Rogue Nation: American Unilateralism and the Failure of Good Intentions” in his possession.

During the detainment, a supervisor asked George his views on the September 11 attacks, according to the Washington Post. The supervisor asked if he knew who carried them out and what language Osama bin Laden speaks. The supervisor then asked: “Do you see why these cards are suspicious?” All three agencies mentioned in the lawsuit declined to comment, but one member of the TSA mentioned that they focused on George because his conduct was "erratic."

The Washington Post states that the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Security Project and its Pennsylvania chapter will be representing George. Ben Wizner, staff attorney with the ACLU, said “Arresting and restraining passengers who pose no threat to flight safety and are not breaking any law not only violates people’s rights, but it won’t make us any safer.”

Members of the We The Kings road crew were entangled in a confrontation with Philadelphia police last night after the Bamboozle Road Show at The Living Arts center. The police officers were attempting to write the members of Mercy Mercedes a ticket for their van which was illegally parked. We The Kings tour manager Travis Fair went out to see what was going on and was allegedly forced back inside. When Fair repeatedly shoved open the door of the venue officers followed him inside the venue and arrested him on the stage.

We The Kings merchandise handler Chris V went outside to see what was going on and was reported to have gotten into an altercation with the police officers and was allegedly beaten. Chris V suffered injuries to the head and was hospitalized after the incident. Fair and two other crewmembers were taken into custody. All members involved in the incident have been released and have not posted any news that there will be delays or cancellations on the tour.

We The Kings front man Travis Clark updated his twitter during the incident saying, “There is nothing worse then a friend asking you for help & knowing you can’t do anything about it cause 5 cops are standing in front of you.”

Philadelphia police were unavailable for comment.

Below is a video of Chris’s arrest made by Artist Approach who were filming that night at the show.
The Bamboozle Road Show(April 26 Philly): Bands, Batons, & Blood

It all began with a girl who had nothing to wear. Liza Goncalves was hosting MADD Sports on BET, and she had resorted to cutting up old jerseys to create dresses for her onscreen wardrobe.‚ 

“It was out of necessity because there was no fashionable sportswear for women,” Goncalves said. “I thought there must be something cute and fashionable for women to wear.”‚ 

Today Goncalves is creating those cute and fashionable pieces with her eco-friendly, Philadelphia-based clothing line, Vintage Blue, which has been popping up in boutiques across the country from Boston to Texas.‚ ‚ 

But shoppers will not find any deconstructed jerseys here. Right now Goncalves’ pieces consist of vintage-inspired T-shirts and tote bags featuring the All-American Girls Professional Baseball Team portrayed in the 1992 feature film “A League of Their Own.” Goncalves said the decision to feature the women’s baseball team was all about finding female inspiration. She did not want to market a clothing line for women that featured men’s sports teams.‚ 

Goncalves ‚ and her partner, Michelle D’Avella, plan to expand the line to include dresses, bags and several other items as soon as they have the means to make them all eco-friendly. While D’Avella was enthusiastic about making the line eco-friendly, it took her a while to be convinced. Finally she saw a television program that tested a mother’s breast milk for chemicals, many of which had come from the mother’s clothing. “I didn’t want to be a part of that,” Goncalves said.‚ 

From that day on the Vintage Blue mission was “Let’s make sure we’re organic. Let’s make sure we don’t waste,” Goncalves said. “We wanted to give our customers quality, fashionable affordable eco-friendly garments.”‚ 

Dismissing the concept that eco-friendly clothes had to be made from hemp or one-color materials, Goncalves created a line of distressed graphic T-shirts and totes ranging in price from $18 to $28.‚ ‚ 

Although the line has been picked up by boutique stores across the country, Vintage Blue sales remain predominantly online on their interactive Web site.‚ Vintage Blue also donates five percent of online sales to Kiva, an organization that provides micro-loans to entrepreneurs in developing countries.‚ 

With a look inspired by vintage paper and scrapbooks, the ‚ site features not only the clothing line, but also Vintage Blue Magazine and a blog to feature Goncalves’ and D’Avella’s work and meetings with celebrities. Also providing customers with an inside scoop on everything from their preliminary ideas to finished products.‚ 

Boston shoppers interested in seeing Goncalves’ ‚ line can visit Bodega on Clearway Street or place their orders online. In‚ approximately‚ seven days you will be rocking in fashionable sport spirit.

State College, Pa. — AccuWeather.com — A large swath of snow will stretch across the northern third of the nation later Thursday through this weekend from a fast-moving “clipper” storm. This storm is found in southern areas of British Columbia and Alberta today and will dive southeast bringing a large area of 3 to 6 inches of snow with isolated 8-inch amounts from the Canadian Prairies through the mid-Atlantic and Northeast, including the cities of New York, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Detroit, Chicago, and Boston. This will potentially be the largest snowfall so far this winter in New York City and Philadelphia.

This storm system will first be dynamically driven, generating all of its own moisture. However, by Friday night, this storm system begins to draw moisture from the Gulf of Mexico due to southerly winds on the southeast side of the low pressure system. More moisture means more snow, but it also means more warmth working into the system. The main forecasting problem with this type of system is the exact track of the low pressure system.

If the track of the system is along the Mason-Dixon Line, cities like Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, and New York will receive moderate snowfall amounts. A track farther north will mean more warmth so less snow will fall in these cities, while cities farther north like Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland, and Boston will get the most snowfall. Baltimore and Washington, D.C., may also get some accumulating snow, but being farther south, the snow will mix with and change to rain during the event.

Current thinking has the storm beginning to affect Chicago Friday around noon, Detroit Friday afternoon, Cleveland before midnight Friday night, Pittsburgh around midnight Friday, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington, D.C., early Saturday morning, New York City late Saturday morning and Boston Saturday afternoon.

Starting next week, extreme cold will blast into the Midwest and Northeast, marking what could be the coldest days of the season for the big cities.

There has been speculation for some time, but now it seems official, the Spectrum in Philly will close at the end of this year and be demolished. The arena is 42-years old.

"This has been one of the hardest decisions I’ve ever had to make," said Ed Snider, Comcast-Spectacor’s chairman. "The Spectrum is my baby. It’s one of the greatest things that has ever happened to me, but after a lot of thinking and discussions, we all feel it is in our best interest to close the Spectrum at the conclusion of the upcoming 2008-09 Philadelphia Phantoms and Kixx seasons."

This will officially end any remnants of Philadelphia sports wins. The 76ers called the Spectrum home in 1983 when they won the NBA title, as did the Flyers who last won a championship in 1975. Veterans Stadium was busted to pieces a few years ago to erase what was left of the Phillies’ house from their 1980 World Series. And the Eagles…well, we know the deal there.

In case you missed, and judging by the amount of people that have sent me the link to the Cnnsi.com story you haven’t, Philadelphia is officially a town that hasn’t had a pro sports championship in 100 seasons. The 76ers won in 1983, and all four teams have now gone winless in their last 25 years. Cnnsi.com has been nice enough to mention it with 100 of the worst things to happen to Philly sports during that time.

You can get Perry’s take right here. He’s as miserable a Philly sports fan as you’ll find.

Check it out, it’s a pretty thorough list. Maybe now you will understand why the fans in Philly are the way they are. From the Fog Bowl to the wet chart to the Allen Iverson “practice” tirade to Scott Rolen to the 1997 Stanley Cup Final fiasco to Shawn Bradley to the Charles Barkley trade to the three-straight NFC Championship game losses…Cnnsi.com has it covered.

Allen Iverson returned to Philadelphia for the first time on Wednesday night, and I was one of the people in the sold-out Wachovia Center. Here’s my diary from the evening:

For the last week my friends were asking me if I would ‘boo’ Iverson. I really thought I was going to. His attitude about practice, towards coaches, and his selfish play on the court really helped him wear out his welcome with me. And since it’s all about me, I called Billy King and told him to trade Iverson to Denver for Andre Miller, Joe Smith, and two first round draft picks. However, I didn’t ‘boo’ him last night. I couldn’t.

He brought me too much excitement over the years. The 2000-01 season and play-off run still goes down as one of my favorite Philadelphia sports seasons. I’ll always remember Allen stepping over Tyronn Lue after draining a basket at the end of Game 1 of the ’01 Finals as I watched the game in a packed bar in Buckhead (Atlanta), Georgia. His ovation last night was deserved. There may have been a few boos early, but they all changed to cheers and claps. Philadelphia loved and valued his time here and as Iverson pounded his chest we knew Iverson felt the same. Philadelphia fans get a bad wrap, but last night they did the right thing, me included.

Then it was game time. Denver throws out Iverson, Carmello Anthony, Kenyon Martin, Anthony Carter and Marcus Camby. How the heck is that team not one of the best eight teams in the Western Conference? Those five players are arguably the best starting unit in the NBA. However, they don’t play defense. I don’t know how many dunks the Sixers had last night, but Denver gives up too many easy buckets. Offensively, they are unstoppable, but George Karl needs to start coaching this team or they aren’t making the playoffs.

More on Karl, at every timeout he stands at the free throw line as the team just sits and relaxes on the bench. One of the assistants kneels down and talks about something, but I didn’t see one player listening. Also during the timeouts, Stacy Augmon comes from the first row, walks around the bench and joins the team on the court. When the timeout ends, he walks back to his seat. Very weird. I looked it up and Augmon is the player development coach for Denver. Therefore, I concluded that the Nuggets feel it’s more important to have Augmon in their huddle rather than their head coach. This team is fighting for a playoff spot. George, what are you doing?

I witnessed something for the first time last night. In the second half, Iverson was at the line and after his first free throw a lane violation was called. The NBA does not have one-and-one foul shots. There is no reason to get in the lane after the first shot. The ball is dead. However, the refs got together and reversed the lane violation. What? How does that happen?

Andre Miller is awesome by the way. He is always under control and you can tell he has that basketball sixth sense. He knows where everyone is on the court and he knows when he needs to shoot the ball. He dropped in 28 points, had 12 assists and came up huge with 1:17 left in the game when he drove the lane and got fouled by Iverson, making the basket and the free throw to give the Sixers a 113-110 lead against his former team. To add to the dramatics, 11 seconds later Iverson drained a three to tie it back up, which caused a roar in the crowd like it was a Nugget home game. On this night it seemed everyone in the stands would be happy with any outcome. During the whole second half it didn’t matter who scored and from what team, the crowd was going completely nuts with every basket.

However, there was a team of Sixers and Sixers’ coaches that wanted nothing more than a win. All night, you could see it in Andre Iguodala’s eyes. You could see it in Willie Green’s eyes. Andre Miller’s as well. They had a point to prove last night. They needed to show Philadelphia how good they are without Allen Iverson. They needed to prove to themselves that they had moved on. And when Iguodala threw the ball up over his head with 32 seconds left and Samuel Dalembert grabbed it, slamming it home to take the lead back, they knew they were one possession away from their biggest victory of the season.

It couldn’t have been written to be any more dramatic. If Iverson nailed a three to win, the roof would have blown off the building. If Iverson tied the game the place would have erupted with anxiousness for another five minutes of free basketball. But neither happened. Iverson was defended perfectly by Iguodala and Green forcing him to miss a shot with seven seconds left. Then, Camby missed a shot with five seconds left. Finally, Iguodala got the loose ball and sprinted down the court. Everyone in the building thought he was coming in for a classic Iggie dunk, but as time ran out he threw the ball up in the rafters, victorious over the original A.I. that ran this city for ten years.

At that moment, they had made their point. This Sixer team can play basketball with the best of them. They play hard, they play as team, they’re young, and they’re exciting. They deserve the city’s support. The Wachovia Center should be rocking every night like it did last night. It was a great moment. I still have chills. I didn’t want to leave. I love this game.

A source close to Eagles Quarterback Donovan McNabb recently told me that the embattled star “absolutely wants to stay” in the City of Brotherly Love.

McNabb told ESPN in a recent interview that he thinks they should bring more star-caliber talent into the Eagles’ the roster. Many think that he is just saying all the right things despite wanting out. Some believe that his vocal desire to add playmakers is an attempt at forcing a trade.

“Donovan definitely wants to stay in Philly,” the source said. “He wants to stay in Philly and win a championship here.”

Most probably wouldn’t blame McNabb one bit if he really did go elsewhere for a fresh start. He’s had to take heat going back to the 1999 draft when he was booed thoroughly after the Eagles made him the second overall pick.

Of course, he was booed for what he wasn’t (Ricky Williams) and not for what he was. Still, he had to stand up there and take it.

In 2003, after a rough start, which included inconsistency and a sore throwing thumb, the Philadelphia faithful clamored for third-string quarterback A.J. Feeley, who had filled in admirably in 2002 when McNabb went down with a cracked ankle (they ignored the fact that he threw four touchdown passes in that game, after the ankle snapped). Even Rush Limbaugh was able to jump in on the McNabb bashing during the 2003 season.

McNabb rebounded from all of it and rattled off nine straight wins that season, leading the Eagles to their fourth-consecutive playoff berth.

At the conclusion of the 2004 season, the Eagles lost in the Super Bowl to the New England Patriots and McNabb was held responsible by the locals. He threw three interceptions — two of them very costly — and was seen vomiting in the huddle towards the end of the game. The phone lines at Philadelphia’s sports radio 610 lit up like a Christmas tree with angry fans harping on his mistakes during the game.

Nowadays fans say Eli Manning grew up in the Super Bowl while Donovan threw up.

In 2005, Terrell Owens openly criticized McNabb as a way to help Owens get a new contract. The quarterback was then thrown under the bus by just about anyone with a pen. His leadership was called into question, and it was widely reported that he lost the locker room. McNabb was ridiculed for taking the high road and not standing up to Owens. Some claimed that he should have physically confronted the mercurial receiver.

“He did not lose that locker room,” a former Eagle teammate told me at the time. “Those guys have Donovan’s back. That stuff isn’t true.”

In 2006, following an injury-shortened season, McNabb found himself on injured reserve for the second straight year when he blew an ACL against the Tennessee Titans. The ire was now centered around his inability to stay healthy.

The NFL Draft last April saw the Eagles draft University of Houston quarterback Kevin Kolb in the second round. It was their first selection in that draft. Since the moment his name was announced, all of the talk has centered around when McNabb will be gone. He has been hammered repeatedly with questions about whether he’s going to stay, whether he wants to stay and whether he thinks the team even wants him anymore.

By the conclusion of the Eagles 8-8 season, McNabb looked bloodied. He looked like a man exhausted from the constant barrage of repetitive questions. No one would be surprised if he privately wished to re-start his career in another city. But, it seems that McNabb has just gotten used to how things work in one of the toughest sports towns in the country.

He has responded to the adversity admirably thus far in his career, and judging by the way his knee seemed to be coming around late in the season, most signs point to him doing it again.