Billboard.com’s Bon Jovi vs. Bruce Springsteen

Thanks to a question that was asked over at Gary Trust’s Ask Billboard column over at Billboard.com, we now have a definitive answer as to who wins the legendary New Jersey grudge match between Bon Jovi and Bruce Springsteen. Here’s the link to the original article:

http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/ask-bb/ask-billboard-basia-bon-jovi-and-the-boss-1003956403.story

Gary didn’t setup a baby pool filled with KY-Jelly in his basement in order for them to gauge the true winner, but he did some research and pulled the record sales of each artist. I’ve reprinted parts of the article with the results:

Listed is the top five selling albums by each artist, including Jon Bon
Jovi’s solo works and Springsteen’s releases with the E Street Band, dating to
the inception of Nielsen SoundScan data in 1991.


Bon Jovi/Jon Bon Jovi:

“Cross Road” (1994), 4,709,000
“Slippery When Wet” (1986), 3,106,000
“Crush” (2000), 2,071,000
“Keep the Faith” (1992), 1,591,000
“Have a Nice Day” (2005), 1,552,000

Bruce Springsteen/E Street Band:

“Greatest Hits” (1995), 4,092,000
“The Rising” (2002), 2,163,000
“Born in the U.S.A.” (1984), 1,463,000
“Human Touch” (1992), 1,168,000
“Magic” (2007), 1,054,000

Combining sales of each act’s albums, the winner is…Bruce
Springsteen. It’s an astonishingly close race, however. In the Nielsen SoundScan
era, Springsteen totals 19,968,000 million in album sales, just ahead of Bon
Jovi’s 19,922,000.Springsteen pulled into the lead with his latest album,
“Working on a Dream.” The set has sold 484,000 copies since its January
release.

Lifestyles of the Rich in New Jersey

I bet there’s tons of people around the country who had no idea that New Jersey was home to so many celebrities. The majority of these celebs own gratuitously huge dwellings that sit on endless amounts of land. I immediately began wondering where I can creepily view Spytech style aerial shots of these celebrity homes? And whammo! Just the other day my boss at work pointed me to a cool time wasting site called Virtual Globetrotting which searches all 50 states for satellite views of celebrity homes and various other POI’s. To look up your state, click here. Now, let me show you just some of the pretentious homes that belong to the stars that reside in The Sexy Armpit a.k.a NJ:

Chris Rock, Alpine NJ
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Jon Bon Jovi, Red Bank NJ
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Eddie Murphy Englewood, NJ
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Bruce Springsteen, Rumson NJ
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Mark Ecko, Bernardsville NJ
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Joe Piscopo, Califon NJ
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Perhaps NJ ain’t so scuzzy after all, huh?

NJ’s Kal Penn Becomes White House Liaison

After marrying, having sex with, and committing domestic abuse against a gigantic bag of weed as Kumar in Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle, actor Kal Penn has become the Associate Director of The White House’s office of Public Liaison. This piece of news gives hope to the millions and MILLIONS of New Jersey stoners out there who are just begging and toiling to acccomplish something this prestigious. It’s clear that one of the reasons the White House wanted Penn is due to his superior work ethic. In addition to his role in the Harold and Kumar series, Penn has also starred as Taj in the Van Wilder series, Superman Returns, and a stint on the TV series 24.

According to Wikipedia:
Penn was born in Montclair and attended Marlboro Middle School and Howell High school in New Jersey. His character on the Princeton, NJ-based show House, Dr. Lawrence Kutner, was recently killed off in order for Penn to begin his work for the White House.

Penn is surely making The Sexy Armpit proud, but I’ll always remember him this way:

New Jersey’s Great Pop Culture Moments Vol.19: Superman Endorsed Palisade’s Park, NJ!

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Until a recent Youtube search, I had no idea that Superman was depicted in ads for NJ’s illustrious Palisades Park. Here’s the original Palisades Park jingle from the ’60s thanks to user Wireman525, who features it on his channel.

Superman is no stranger to amusement parks and he clearly looks happy inviting us to “be his guest” at Palisades Park. For many years Palisades Park actually did reign as one of “America’s Greatest Amusement Parks” like the ad states. Since it closed in 1971, parks that house pulse pounding thrill rides have rendered all other theme parks extinct like dinosaurs. If you’re like me and frequent the Six Flags brand of theme parks, then you’re familiar with the various roller coasters based on good ol’ Supes. Here’s the rundown courtesy of SupermanHomepage.com:
Superman: Ride of Steel (S.F New England & S.F Darien Lake, S.F America, S.F Spain)
Superman: Escape (S.F Magic Mountain, & WB. Movie World, Australia)
Superman: Ultimate Flight (SF Great Adventure NJ, S.F Over Georgia, S.F Great America) Superman: Krypton Coaster (SF Fiesta Texas)
Superman: Tower of Power (S.F Dallas/Ft. Worth & S.F St. Louis)
Superman: The Ultimate Escape (S.F Mexico)
By today’s standards, the Palisades jingle probably seems cheesy to many people, especially those who grew up hearing the inordinately obnoxious “Sunday, Sunday, Sunday” Monster Truck spots. Those commercials pretty much obliterated the chance of any other commercials/jingles grabbing our attention ever again (unless it’s the annoying “gimme back that filet-o-fish” song.) In case you couldn’t make them out, here’s the lyrics to the Palisades Park jingle courtesy of PalisadesPark.com:
Palisades has the rides, Palisades has the fun
Come On Over
Shows and dancing are free, so’s the parking, so gee
Come On Over
Palisades from coast to coast, where a dime buys the most
Palisades Amusement Park, Swings all day and after dark
Ride the coaster, Get cool, In the waves in the pool
You’ll have fun, so..
Come On Over
Surprisingly, this isn’t the only time a DCU character has talked about Palisades Park. Click here to read NJ’s Great Pop Culture Moments Vol.7, which features Jonathan Osterman’s (Dr. Manhattan) trip to the amusement park from the pages of Watchmen!

MEME: 6 Random Things

The Rules:

1) Link to the person who tagged you.
2) Post the rules on your blog.
3) Write six random things about yourself.
4) Tag six people at the end of your post and link to them.
5) Let each of the six persons know they’ve been tagged and leave a comment on their blog.
6) Let the tagger know when your entry is up.

I was tagged by Chris at When is Evil Cool?, an awesome pop culture blog that I’ve been reading for a few months now! Check it out! Thanks for tagging The Sexy Armpit Chris!

Pets

The only pets I’ve ever owned were a bird and fish. I would love to own a dog or cat but ultimately something always hinders me. Could it be because the bird and the fish died? It feels like a pet wasn’t meant for me even though I’d love some cuddly Gizmo type creature to hang out with when I get home from work. I’ve been looking into adopting a genetically engineered purple lynx named Bubastis. Hopefully Craigslist will have one…

Traveling

I’d like to do all of my traveling within the U.S via a Winnebago a la Lone Star. Many people I talk to put so much emphasis on visiting other countries, and I can understand why. There’s an abundance of beautiful places and cultures to discover around the world, but we in the U.S forget about our own 50 states. I love California, especially San Diego and Los Angeles. I would own property there if I had $$$. I’m thinking of borrowing Lone Star’s Winnebago and enlisting Barf to pilot the thing. Once we get some Jovi cranking, I’ll grab a few of my friends and make our way around the country. If Lone Star won’t give up his ride, then I’ll hit up David and see if he’ll let me borrow his alien ship Max from Flight of the Navigator. At the end of our country wide tour we’ll make our way home, which for my entire life has been right here in The Sexy Armpit aka New Jersey.

Childhood

My favorite period of my life is early childhood. No surprise there, right? I’d say from age 3 through 9 were my all time best years of my life. When gauged, my friends and co-workers frequently tell me that middle school, high school, and college are their favorite eras of their lives. The amount of great memories I have from childhood are innumerable. It’s not just hindsight, but I truly feel that it was just about as perfect as it could have been. I was able to enjoy everything from Three’s Company to the A-Team, He-Man and Thundercats, Back to the Future, The Goonies, Ghostbusters and the resurgence of Batman. The toys I got to play with will never be beaten. I was always using my imagination and people actually encouraged me to do so. I was on the cusp of the computer generation. I became familiar with computers from a class at school but my family didn’t own a PC until the mid ’90s. I was fortunate enough to have a mixture of influences from the late ’70s and the early ’80s.

Tattoos/Piercings

I have 3 tattoos and if they weren’t so damn expensive I’d have at least 3 more. Presently, a lightning bolt resides on my left shoulder, there’s a burst of flames shooting up from my lower abdomen, and I have a star with green fire on my right bicep. Both of my ears are pierced – my left ear has 2. There was no rhyme or reason to that, I just gave up on piercing after a while. I’d love to have my lower lip pierced on one side, (not in the center) I think it looks cool but my boss at work nixed the idea. In today’s world it doesn’t seem like a big deal considering all the different wacky things people are doing, but it’s a corporate environment so there’s supposed to be some sort of decorum. Boooo!

Fitness

I’ve been working out since I was 13 but I despise every second of it. I’m not one of those people who is all smiles after a workout. Sure, the endorphin rush makes me feel good, but who in their right mind wants to work out? Isn’t it so much more fun to vegetate, eat some snacks on the couch, and watch TV after a grueling day at work? I have to literally drag myself to the gym after work and it’s only a short trip down the street from my place! I actually do enjoy running and riding my bike, but only if it’s not cold outside. I’ve become quite the pussy over the years. Oh yeah…and I still watch cartoons and wrestling so SUCK IT!





Rock Band

I don’t ski, snowboard, rollerblade, or take part in rugby, but I do enjoy playing Guitar Hero and Rock Band. My Rock Band 2 band name is The Big Titheads. I played for 3 hours straight the other night. I’ve got some pretty rad hair and a ridiculously slim waistline. It looks totally unhealthy come to think of it. I’m really into the hot female drummer I’ve enlisted. She’s got blonde hair with pink highlights and long pigtails. I don’t find it strange at all that I’m attracted to a girl made of pixels, they make those chicks hot on purpose! One of my favorite songs to play is “Pump it Up” by Elvis Costello, among others. I’ve also come to realize that my pinkies are completely useless.

You’re tagged!

Jason at Sonic Dork

Chunky B from Eclectorama

Reis from Geek Orthodox 

Blondie’s “Union City Blue” Video

The video for Blondie’s “Union City Blue,” released in 1979, was filmed right on the docks in Union City, NJ. The track was featured in Oliver Stone’s 1981 horror film The Hand and it’s also been covered by Radiohead and The Black Kids w/ Cut Copy. Blondie frontwoman Debbie Harry grew up in Hawthorne, NJ and was once a dancer in Union City. If you’ve never visited New Jersey, this video provides you with some magnificent scenic visuals. Note to self: that didn’t sound anywhere near as dryly sarcastic as intended. Also of note, Union City is the site of The Park Theater where a few of New Jersey’s most prominent pop culture moments have taken place, namely the recording of George Carlin’s “What Am I Doing in New Jersey?”

Cinderella’s Golden Carrousel from Maplewood, NJ

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You don’t need EZ-Pass to go on this ride, and probably not even a Fast-Pass. The handmade golden carrousel actually spent close to 40 years in New Jersey before becoming dedicated to Cinderella as part of the Magic Kingdom theme park in Florida’s Walt Disney World. **The above excerpt was scanned from The Walt Disney World Trivia Book Vol.1: Secrets, History, & Fun Facts Behind the Magic by Louis A. Mongello.

Maxim Magazine Declares New Jersey “The Most Toxic Place in The U.S”

In Maxim Magazine’s June 2008 issue, Nick Peterson from Akron, Ohio raised a rather amusing question in the Ask Maxim column. The answer made me feel completely validated as to why I’ve dedicated this website to the most contradictory state in the union. The “beautiful” Garden State, is also recognized by the EPA for having the MOST toxic sites in America! 115 in total! What I find hysterical is that I could eventually wind up looking like Melvin Ferd aka The Toxic Avenger pretty soon, considering I live in one of the counties mentioned in the article!
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Tammy Lynn Sytch “Sunny” is March’s Garden State Playmate!

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Boy, was I a horny little kid! Both sides of an 8 1/2 x 11 sheet of paper isn’t nearly enough space to list all the crushes I had on famous women back when my age was in the single digits. Let me see, there was Yvonne Craig aka Batgirl, She-Ra, Marcia Brady, Nicole Eggert, Alyssa Milano Stephanie Zinone (Michelle Pfeiffer in Grease 2), Victoria Principal, Madonna, The Sagal twins, Miss Elizabeth…the list would literally take up 5-7 extremely long blog posts.

Eventually Playboy models would replace the aforementioned bevy of women and fictional characters on my list. Having an affinity for a pre-boob job Pamela Anderson and a fresh faced Jenny McCarthy helped create a new, more mature me. I felt that it was time to graduate from She-Ra to women who were more tangible with a greater ability to “satisfy me” in a roundabout sort of way. During the time I discovered those fine ladies, most of my friends were unaware of the beautiful women that lived within the pages of Playboy Magazine. Even though it was only a short time that I was able to brag to my circle of friends about “discovering” these sexy women, I still felt distinguished. In my mind I was sleeking around in a smoking jacket toking on a pipe like Hef.

My cavalcade of hot crushes were in their own exclusive world. Never for a minute could I imagine they would converge into my own little far off planet of comic books, music, and pro-wrestling. To my supreme excitement, it actually happened when Pamela Anderson walked Big Daddy Cool Diesel down to the ring while Jenny McCarthy escorted The Heartbreak Kid Shawn Michaels at Wrestlemania 11. It was a surreal moment considering it made me feel like my passion for these girls willed it to happen. It was that, or the fact that Vince McMahon has been wire tapping my phone since I was 6 years old. (The CIA refuses to entertain my suspicions despite my constant complaints.) Regardless of how it happened, these ladies weren’t marks for the business. I knew they were only appearing at Wrestlemania because of the big pay day. This large check gave them the option to enlarge or deflate their breasts at their every whim.

So…yeah…Playboy models are great but they’re so one dimensional, aren’t they? In 1995, a woman was about to enter my radar and totally obliterate all other sexy blips on it like she was the laser cannon in Space Invaders. The only difference? She wasn’t just made up of pixels, she was for real, she was from New Jersey, and she didn’t take anyone’s shit.

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She is Tammy Lynn Sytch, aka Sunny: the first true WWE Diva. After working for Smoky Mountain Wrestling, Sunny entered the WWF as an on-air anchor promoting house shows. She eventually grabbed the attention of all the WWF fans as manager of the Bodydonnas. From then on, Vince and the WWF became bent on creating female superstars referring to them as “Divas.” Unfortunately for Divas past and present, none of them can or will ever hold a candle to Sunny.
Truly “making it” in pro wrestling takes guts, personality, and some severe delusions. Sunny had a perfect melange of all these ingredients. She was unabashed on the mic, a natural at generating heat with the crowd, and simply a born entertainer. Just like Sensational Sherri before her, Sunny wouldn’t think twice about interfering in a bout, distracting the ref, or getting caught up in a melee, as long as her men won the match. The fact that she was so good at being a “WWF Superstar” made her even more sexy in my eyes as well as in the minds of the millions of other wrestling fans who relentlessly downloaded her swimsuit pics on America Online. (Keep in mind, back then it took 5 minutes to download one low quality .jpg!)

To all the negative, idiotic, and obsessive freaks out there on the Internet who give wrestling fans a bad name: Sunny paved the way for all the Divas who came after her. You know the ones – the ones with non existent mic skills, the ones who can’t deliver their lines let alone remember them, the ones who look awkward in the ring, the ones who are in it not for the love of wrestling, but because they won a friggin’ contest. Sunny “brought it” all the time with that special factor that only few had. If Sable didn’t have gigantic fake boobs and never posed for Playboy, she would scarcely be remembered at this point. Unlike Sable, Sunny wasn’t just a pretty face, she knew the business. She can take her spot right next to the Bobby Heenans, Mr. Fujis, Jim Cornettes, and all the rest of them. There’s no doubt that Miss Elizabeth will always hold a special place in my heart, but she wasn’t much more than a valet and eye candy, while Sunny served both those purposes and more. Sunny owned her star quality which catapulted her to the forefront of storylines. She single handedly made the tag team scene in the WWF infinitely more interesting.

Sunny, was a sex symbol with actual talent for the business, a rare discovery. Sunny was the girl I didn’t think existed. A hot girl with a killer bod who was also into pro wrestling at a time when it had somehow become reserved exclusively for geeks. Was she for real, or did I create her in the garage with power tools? I began to move on from the Pams and Jennys as I realized that there would soon be an epic crossover as hot women surged into pro wrestling. Thank you Sunny for uniting these two worlds, and making us feel less geeky for being pro wrestling fans.

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For other wrestling related articles check out the Classic WWE/WWF Event Cards from NJ !!!

Buried Treasure? X Marks the Spot in New Jersey

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“You sound just as corny as Dad does…”
– Brandon Walsh, The Goonies

I grew up watching my father’s favorite classic pirate movies with him, and in turn I would show him my favorite movie ever, The Goonies. Chunk only had old Hanukkah decorations in his attic. Mikey had a shitload of cool pirate stuff that was intended to make it’s way into an Astoria museum. My attic was filled with my sister’s old dolls and a bunch of other household junk that had been banished to the black hole by my mom. If it was up to my Dad, it would have all went straight into the trash. Even though we didn’t have historical stuff from the pirate days, my Dad did bestow upon me something that always made me think he dreamed of going on a Goonie adventure of his own someday. One weekend he brought me to his room and opened the doors of his chest of drawers, lifted up a stack of sweaters and shirts, and pulled out a folded, burnt up paper that was hidden underneath:

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My Dad handed me the paper and told me it was “a real treasure map!” If I was any more excited my eyeballs would’ve fallen right out of their sockets like Ragetti’s in Pirates of the Caribbean. I unfolded the old map, careful not to tear the delicate artifact. The map was titled “Treasure Map,” (awesomely appropriate).

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The map outlined possible sites where pirates may have buried their treasure, or their ships sunk along the east coast. Luckily for him, my dad didn’t try to convince me that Captain Kidd or Blackbeard sealed this map in one of the walls of our house because the copyright is 1965. I was a little kid, but damn was I perceptive.

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My father and I were able to continue enjoying the pirate genre beginning in 2003 thanks to the release of the Pirates of the Caribbean. I saw POTC more than 5 times in the theater and it gave me the same feeling of wonder that opening this map did. It’s amazing that my father got this map as a souvenir on vacation nearly 40 years before we went to the theater to see POTC together. Perhaps he held onto it because it gave him that adventurous feeling that we all have when we’re young. He kept it to hand down to me, and I’ve had it ever since. In essence, I don’t have to go searching because the map is “good enough” treasure for me.
Is your life is in need of some adventure? Maybe this map will assist in your hunt. Here’s a closer look at possible sites where treasure is buried in New Jersey:

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On your quest, try to avoid any run-ins with the Fratellis, and don’t tell mom you’re going because I have a date with Andy on Friday, limp lungs!