Video: Strange noises terrify TX and OK, Popocatepetl rumbling

Reuters.com screen capture shows volcano

Every day brings us closer to Mayan Doomsday — Mother Earth will not rest.

Terrified reports of strange, unearthly noises have moved from the Upper Midwest and Canada to the Southwest, scaring the crap out of people in Amarillo, TX and rural Rogers County, OK.

South of the border, Mexican authorities just raised the alert level at the Popocatepetl volcano outside Mexico City.

The Amarillo incident is on video shot by two DJs from KISS FM who ran out of the studio to capture the ghostly howl (below).

Mas…Video: Strange noises terrify TX and OK, Popocatepetl rumbling

Kids, lowrider bikes, culture and history in Tucson 1996: ‘Low y Cool’


When a French filmmaker shoots Chicano Tucson, the result is fascinating and maybe a little bit foreign — in a good way. Low y Cool documents the lives of the Camaradas Lowrider Bike Club in South Tucson, AZ in 1996. The 52-minute video was directed by Tucson resident and transplanted Frenchie Marianne Dissard with funding from French TV channel Planête Cable. The film has been seen regularly since 1997 on Planête.

Un chico makes his own arcade: Caine’s Arcade


This has got to be the most wondrous film about a small Latino businessman ever made. Caine Monroy, a nine-year-old from East L.A.,  built his own DIY arcade out of cardboard boxes from his dad’s car parts store. He charges a dollar for two plays, but you really ought to get the Superpass, which is a good deal. He has designed security features with 99 Cent Store calculators, and an ingenious ticket delivery system that you have to see to believe. The excellent and funny short film is by Nirvan Mullick, who was Caine’s first and only customer — for a little bit, anyhow.

Watch the movie and warm your corazon!

Help Caine’s Scholarship Fund:

Caine’s Arcade online:

 

POCHO remembers ñewsman Mike Wallace of CBS-TV’s ’60 Minutes’


Mike Wallace, iconic hard-hitting interviewer and 60 Minutes OG, died Sunday at 93.

For one classic story, Wallace went to China to track down the manufacturer of counterfeit American toys and ended up confronting a smarmy, chain-smoking attorney, Nathan Thurm, Esq. Thurm was not pleased.

Disinformation Company: Doomsday 2012 Science or Superstition?


Yo what is up with all this Mayan Doomsday 2012 stuff? We need some disinformation and we need it now, and that’s why we turned to the Disinformation Company for this video. Like check it:

Disinformation Company producer Gary Baddeley, director Nimrod Erez and the Disinformation team contacted and arranged interviews with multiple experts, often obtaining speedy access due to more than ten years of working with them or colleagues in their fields!

Mas…Disinformation Company: Doomsday 2012 Science or Superstition?

From Coldrank for Trayvon: ‘Black Man’ (music video)


Citing Malcom X, MLK and Michael Jackson, rapper Coldrank‘s Black Man explores, shall we say, discrepancies in society’s treatment of blacks killing blacks, blacks killing whites and whites killing blacks. And those that don’t learn from history, he reminds us, are doomed to repeat it. Directed by Joe Mexican.

Video: Tortilla-chip UFO buzzes York, England — again


“The mysterious Dudley Dorito UFO has been spotted for the fourth time in five years flying through a cloudless sky over woodland in Yorkshire,” reports Britain’s The Sun:

The object, which looks like an extra-terrestrial tortilla chip, was captured by an amateur cameraman who posted the footage on YouTube. He can be heard saying “I don’t know what that is” as the triangular aircraft glides silently across the frame above a forest in the north of England.

The UFO was dubbed the Dudley Dorito after its first sighting over the Midlands in 2007 but it is unclear whether the YouTube footage is real or a hoax.

Chicano? Mexican? Cuban? Boricuan? Latino? Hispanic? What are you?


NBCLatino asked POCHO Jefe-in-Chief Lalo Alcaraz whether he’s a Chicano or Latino or Mexican or Hispanic.

Lalo was commenting on the Pew Hispanic Center survey everybody is talking about:

Nearly four decades after the United States government mandated the use of the terms “Hispanic” or “Latino” to categorize Americans who trace their roots to Spanish-speaking countries, a new nationwide survey of Hispanic adults finds that these terms still haven’t been fully embraced by Hispanics themselves. A majority (51%) say they most often identify themselves by their family’s country of origin; just 24% say they prefer a pan-ethnic label.

Mas…Chicano? Mexican? Cuban? Boricuan? Latino? Hispanic? What are you?

Is guitarist and singer Omar Torrez the Latino Jimi Hendrix?

Omar Torrez sure can play! That’s why he toured with Tom Waits and played with others like the Buena Vista Social Club and Jethro Tull. The Los Angeles Times wrote: “Dare we dub him the Latin Hendrix?! The fastest fingers in the West, a massive talent poised to break out and kiss the sky.”

Omar Torrez describes his music as “equal parts rock, Latin, delta blues, atonal classical, and performance art.” His heritage is as diverse as his music, ranging from Spanish and Basque (via Mexico) to Norwegian, Native American and Russian roots.

We especially like his new release — a happy-go-lucky smile of a tune called Marina (play this loud!) which will have you chair-dancing in no time at all. Srsly.

‘Coonskin’ animated masterpiece by Ralph Bakshi explores racism


[NSFW. This is totally not safe for work. F word, N word etc.] We were very surprised to see it online and don’t know how long it will be available. Ralph Bakshi’s Coonskin is

… a subversive and satirical re-imagining of Disney’s Song Of The South with an urban spin, Ralph Bakshi’s incendiary masterpiece Coonskin exploits and eviscerates grotesque American racial stereotypes with a politically incorrect, profane and vicious sense of humor. Dangerous Minds

Superhero Video: The Adventures of Paleta Man (Parts 1 & 2)


The Adventures of Paleta Man is the story of an ice cream man who becomes a superhero. And this video — hold on now — is an adaptation of a coloring book based on the Paleta Man screenplay by independent writer/filmmaker Paul Ramirez of Austin, TX. The video is best when played fullscreen. The plot:

Esteban Ruiz makes a living by selling ice cream. A good and hardworking man, Esteban enjoys his job, especially when it brings him closer to Margarita Morales, the woman he loves. But being a modest man makes Esteban an easy target. He has been bullied, and becomes frustrated by his inability to defend himself. His fate suddenly changes when he purchases an antique wooden box. The box contains a magical medallion that gives Esteban special abilities. With his newly acquired strength, he decides to help those in need and punish criminals. He calls himself Paleta Man. When a villain captures Margarita, Esteban will need all of his super powers.

Part 2 — Secret of the Gold Medallion — is below.

Mas…Superhero Video: The Adventures of Paleta Man (Parts 1 & 2)

California’s new official poetry man is Juan Felipe Herrera (video)


Gov. Jerry Brown has sworn in UC Riverside professor Juan Felipe Herrera as California’s Poet Laureate — the first Chicano to get the honor. In this video, Herrera reads his poem 187 reasons Mexicanos can’t cross the border. The poem illustrates the difference between Jerry Brown’s California and Jan Brewer’s Hate State of Arizona, where Mexican-American Studies are outlawed. Cali isn’t perfect, but at least we know where we came from.

Laurel and Hardy are El Gordo y El Flaco in ‘El Flaco Va Al Dentista’


Is Will Ferrell — currently starring in Casa de Mi Padre — the first Anglo comic actor to make a Spanish-language comedy without knowing a word of Spanish?

No guey! As you can see in this old movie clip, black and white jailbirds Oliver Hardy and Stan Laurel AKA El Gordo y El Flaco visited the Dentista and delivered their lines phonetically from a script 60 or more years ago. If you don’t know about Ferrell’s movie, you can peep the trailer below — it’s in Spanish AND color!

Mas…Laurel and Hardy are El Gordo y El Flaco in ‘El Flaco Va Al Dentista’

Punk pioneer Alice ‘Bag’ Velasquez tells all in ‘Violence Girl’ (videos)

Alice now
Alice then

Alicia Velasquez AKA “Alice Bag” — music scene pioneer in first-wave L.A. punk band The Bags — went on the road this winter to promote her autobiography Violence Girl. After a record store appearance, she answered a few questions for Punk Globe magazine.

Here’s the interview and the “trailer” for her book. Yes, books have trailers. And check out The Bags performance video and the vintage gurl-punk Cholitas footage — all below.

Mas…Punk pioneer Alice ‘Bag’ Velasquez tells all in ‘Violence Girl’ (videos)

Offensive? Skweezy Jibbs calls homie Jose ‘a crazy Mexican’ (NSFW)

There’s a fine line between an honest expression of one’s feelings and being a pendejo. Does YouTube rant-meister Skweezy Jibbs cross the line? Skweezy’s description of his homeboy Jose as “a crazy Mexican” offends a party-goer and sets Skweezy off on a three-minute rant. (Totally NSFW rude language and rude ideas.)

So what do you think? Are people today just way too gosh darn sensitive?
Tell it like it is in the comments below!

Meet America’s first Latino astronaut: José Jiménez (audio video)

Just around the time actual Latino astronaut José Hernández was born, actor and comic Bill Dana (not a Latino) got famous playing José Jiménez, a sweet but dimwitted astronaut with a thick Latino accent.

It was the beginning of the Space Race and astronauts were America’s new heroes, but the very idea of a Chicano in space was a joke.

Mas…Meet America’s first Latino astronaut: José Jiménez (audio video)

Flying chupacabra kills 35 sheep in Michoacan (three videos)

Almost three dozen sheep lie dead in a corral in Michoacan and one witness blames a creature with fangs and wings. From Britain’s Daily Mail:

When farmers in Mexico found 35 of their sheep slaughtered with significant claw and tooth marks around their necks, they had one creature to blame – the legendary chupacabra. One man tending to the sheep overnight in the small Mexican town of Paracuaro said he saw animals with sharp fangs and wings kill the livestock. Dubbed the ‘Bigfoot of Latin culture,’ the chupacabra is a legendary four-legged creature that many think is responsible for attacking and killing livestock.

But how does a flying chupacabra compare with a flying purple people eater? And who wants to actually SEE a flying saucer? Two music videos below provide the answers

Mas…Flying chupacabra kills 35 sheep in Michoacan (three videos)

Mayan Doomsday (the video): ‘2012 The Mayan Word’


Here’s a novel idea: Why not ask some Mayans about the impending apocalypse? Undercurrents Alternative News did just that in 2012 The Mayan Word. In Spanish and English with English subtitles, this hour-long documentary takes a look at the impending death and obliteration of the world as we know it and beginning of our glorious metamorphosis into luminous beings of light in the Singularity to come. Or maybe not. The official writeup is below.

Mas…Mayan Doomsday (the video): ‘2012 The Mayan Word’