A Big Night for No Age

A couple of days ago, No Age guitarist Randy Randall wrote about taping a song for Craig Ferguson. He'd worn an Obama T-shirt to the show, which he kept on throughout rehearsal. He said that five minutes before the taping, however, that because of the equal time rule, he wouldn't be allowed to wear the shirt on the air. Instead of walking out, which was his initial impulse, he decided to turn the shirt inside out and write "Free Health Care" as his message instead. I think primarily through Stereogum, the story got out and made a few higher-profile blogs. The band had been told that the performance would air on October 27, but CBS (or the Ferguson staff) decided to jump on the publicity and air it tonight. Ferguson introduced them by talking about the controversy (paraphrase: "Yeah, stick it to the man--oh, wait a minute, I'm the man . . . well, stick it to me anyway!") and mentioning that part of the point of punk bands is to rock the boat and cause trouble. No Age may have some short-term frustration if they were preparing their own publicity push for later in the month, but if they're able to capitalize on this notoriety, they'll get quite a bit more attention than they would have in a late October appearance wearing an Obama T-shirt.

In a serendipitous but unrelated (or was it?) development, over on ABC tonight, Foals appeared on Jimmy Kimmel in a rerun from a couple of weeks ago. There'd have been no reason to mention it, except that guitarist Jimmy Smith was wearing a No Age T-shirt (that's a link to the T-shirt, not to Foals). What would Jung and Sting say?