Doctors at Ascot Hospital discharged Keith Richards yesterday after he underwent surgery to relieve bleeding in his head. The 62-year-old guitarist had earlier fallen from a coconut tree in Fiji. Said Richards: “Personally I would like to thank everyone at Ascot Hospital for the truly wonderful care I received. From the doctors to the beautiful ladies who make painful nights less painful and shorter. I’m pretty much at a loss for words to express my deep gratitude. I hope I wasn’t too much of a pain in the arse–after all it was my head they fixed. Many thanks, Kiwis.”

Further proof that Keith Richards is indestructible.

Sexy lax legend Jenny has a post that will make your weekend:

Lindsay Lohan’s record label, Universal Music Group, has been fined $12 million for payola today. . . . Sony was already fined $10 million and Warner Music Group was fined $5 million, but the fine was higher for Universal Music Group since they have done the most damage to our ears. All of the aforementioned companies are responsible for forcing garbage like Jessica Simpson, Jennifer Lopez, Good Charlotte and Lindsay Lohan on radio listeners.

The investigation was spearheaded by future New York governor Eliot Spitzer. Fox News has the details:

Lohan is no singer, and no one, not even her movie fans, wanted her albums or to hear her on the radio.

Nevertheless, the record company persisted. A series of e-mails in June 2005 shows what was happening — a manipulation of MTV’s “Total Request Live” show that airs every afternoon and can seriously affect a new record’s fortunes.

UMG, according to Spitzer’s reports, was spending money at radio stations and for “TRL” to “stuff the ballot box” (my words) and turn losers into winners.

The memo series is all about one subject: “We are hiring a request company starting Monday to jack TRL for Lindsay…Guys this is a no win situation how should I respond…there is no airplay we have been pursuing…”

Even more troubling, but not surprising, is a group called Dream originally found by Sean “Diddy” Combs. A July 2003 e-mail tells the story:

“Okay, this is not fun for me. I’ve been consumed all day with calls with etc bitching about our radio picture on Dream. Confidentially pop has spent $196,000 and r/c has spent $72,000 … This is embarrassing a total lack of accountability. We have gotten ripped off beyond belief, we better turn this thing around or it’s our a**. That’s almost $300,000 and they are looking for some heads…bad bad bad…If I find out that deals were cut with lack of airplay and overnight spins starting with the nationals, as they say heads are gonna roll, including mine.”

Spitzer is going to run for president some day and for all I know his platform will include tripling taxes, outlawing fried food, and imposing sharia.

Still, it’ll be awfully tempting to vote for him . . .

Galley Brother and Personal Hero B.J. was there and has this report:

Wii: Console: The best looking of all of the new consoles. It’s very small and very hot, but I’m not sure if they cheated to reduce the size. The power brick could be as big as 360’s or bigger. I couldn’t see one so I can’t tell. The graphics are a bit nicer than this generation’s, but they don’t compare to the 360 or PS3.

Controller: Freakin awesome. Very odd for about the first 10 seconds, after that it seems very natural. The motion sensors worked very well, and there did not seem to be any lag. I had a little difficulty with aiming/pointing at first. The Nintendo guy told me the problem was that we were set up a bit too close. This seemed like a reasonable explanation and in any event, the problem was minor.

Games: Nintendo claimed that there were 27 different games to play. This number is a bit inflated because some of the different games were the bare-bones baseball, golf, and tennis game that are all going to be packaged together. Still, there were a bunch of games that seemed to be pretty far along in development. I played Red Steel and Madden.

Red Steel: FPS game with shooting and sword fighting. Very generic. Looks like it could probably play on the current systems. You aim with the remote to shoot, move with the nunchuk (that’s actually what they’re calling it, only they spell it correctly). Shake the nunchuk to reload/open doors/press buttons. The game forces you to shoot guys with guns and swordfight guys with swords, even though I completely wanted to go Indiana Jones and shoot the boss who used a sword. The controls were pleasantly responsive and made a nondescript game pretty fun.

Madden: The most fun I had playing any game there. The graphics looked pretty identical to PS2 Madden ’06. In the demo, you start out doing the pocket presence throwing drill, then the field goal kicking drill, then 2 minutes as the Steelers against the Seahawks. To throw the ball you press the direction pad/button on the remote for the corresponding receiver and make a downward flick/throwing motion with the remote. To kick, you line up your kick, press a button to start the kicker moving and flick the remote up–the harder you flick it, the more kicking power and if you don’t hold the remote level while flicking it up you add some slice in the direction you’re tilting. When running the ball, you juke by moving the remote and stiff arm by moving the nunchuk.

PS3: Console: Big & ugly. Absolutely gorgeous graphics, I’d say probably better than the 360, but I never saw the 2 side by side. Did I mention it’s going to cost $600?

Controller: It’s the same controller they’ve been using for years. And, as such it controls exactly the same. I sort of missed the force feedback, but it’s something you can live without. The 6 axis of movement worked very well for controlling the plane in Warhawk, and felt pretty natural. Warhawk was the only game that used this feature.

Games: I’d say they had about 10 different games playable. Most of them were listed as being 30 – 50% complete. Gorgeous graphics, but I felt like I’ve played them all before. I played Sonic, Heavenly Swords (or Heavenly Blades), Resistance: The Fall of Man, and Madden.

Sonic: I only played about 10 seconds of this and didn’t get to see Sonic running at full speed, but it felt like just about every Sonic game since Sonic Dreamcast.

Heavenly Sword or whatever it was called: You play as an attractive scantily clad chick who swings two big blades/swords to beat up guys in what I’d say in an ancient Rome setting. The playable level had you in a small coliseum type room beating about 4 waves of soldiers and the boss. Lots of destructible tables. Gorgeous to look at incredibly fluid controls, very cinematic. Problem is its God of War with better graphics and a chick. Her weapons and the way she used them looked exactly like the weapons in God of War.

Resistance: FPS with human soldiers fighting aliens in a ruined/destroyed city. It’s you and a bunch of AI controlled humans launching an attack on aliens in a ruined city (the urban combat was similar to a WWII shooter with aliens instead of Nazis). Lots of stuff on screen, very pretty, very good AI. Like most FPS games feels like it has been done before.

Madden: The new features, like playing as the lead blocker, weren’t playable. Incredibly detailed, but played the same as Madden ’06 PS2.

Random games:

Justice League PS2: Top down, hack & slash, that gives you 2 Justice League heroes on screen and a bunch of enemies. Think X-Men Legends with 2 people in your party instead of 4–and slower. Everything moved slowly, I was surprised to find out that the game was almost done.

Deadrising 360: 3rd person action game where you’re a freelance newspaper reporter trapped in a mall/park in a zombie infested town. Everything can be used as a weapon, you have to stay alive for 72 hours waiting for a helicopter to rescue you, and you try to save some people. Fun, lots of stuff on screen at once, very interactive environments. Each weapon only has one attack; the zombies are slow enough to not seem very threatening. Could end up being a very fun game.

Frontline, or Front Mission, or Last Line 360: Deeply generic 3rd person shooter for the 360. The only thing that makes it different is that you’re on a planet with lots of deep snow so you move slowly.

Okami PS2: Cell shaded, action/platformer with calligraphy elements (at anytime you can switch to a calligraphy pad draw something and have it affect the environment. Very pretty look, seems somewhat different.

Stranglehold 360 & PS3: John Woo-Chow Yun Fat action game. Incredibly destructible environment. Shoot columns and debris comes off; enemies cover their faces from flying debris, lots of John Woo style action, slide across tables & counters, diving onto carts and shoot people while the carts are moving, build up points and pull of a special move to clear the room and bring in doves. Used bullet time, looked fun, didn’t seem overly original.

Is out on DVD. Slate has the details. He-Man, it turns out, was gay:

The best part about rewatching He-Man, after the initial nostalgia-burst, was tracking the show’s hilarious accidental homo-eroticism—an aspect I missed completely as a first-grader. In the ever-growing lineup of “outed” classic superheroes, He-Man might be the easiest target of all. It’s almost too easy: Prince Adam, He-Man’s alter ego, is a ripped Nordic pageboy with blinding teeth and sharply waxed eyebrows who spends lazy afternoons pampering his timid pet cat; he wears lavender stretch pants, furry purple Ugg boots, and a sleeveless pink blouse that clings like saran wrap to his pecs. To become He-Man, Adam harnesses what he calls “fabulous secret powers”: His clothes fall off, his voice drops a full octave, his skin turns from vanilla to nut brown, his giant sword starts gushing energy, and he adopts a name so absurdly masculine it’s redundant. Next, he typically runs around seizing space-wands with glowing knobs and fabulously straddling giant rockets. He hangs out with people called Fisto and Ram Man, and they all exchange wink-wink nudge-nudge dialogue: “I’d like to hear more about this hooded seed-man of yours!” “I feel the bony finger of Skeletor!” “Your assistance is required on Snake Mountain!” Once you start thinking along these lines, it’s impossible to stop.

It’s not often that something happens somewhere on this planet just for me, but there it is: a Heat videogame.

Throw in Batman as a secret character you can unlock and . . .

Please note that I didn’t write a single word about Kobe’s 3-shot second-half performance against the Suns in Game 7. But Sam Anderson has some things to say on the subject:

Since Michael Jordan’s final title in 1998, NBA superstars have suffered mightily from what Harold Bloom termed “anxiety of influence.” The Jordan myth—a morality play about how dedication, respect for the game, and loving your parents makes you the undisputed greatest person in the world—has stifled an entire generation of great players. But, as Jordan’s most talented immediate successor, Kobe has been uniquely warped. He’s plagiarized MJ’s game so expertly that, in many ways, he’s ahead of the master’s curve—Kobe is stronger than the 27-year-old Jordan and has a deadlier outside shot. But for all his miraculous skills, Kobe is painfully bad at mythmaking. Since he’s a Jordan-like talent, Kobe clearly thinks that he’s entitled to the Jordan mythology, but he doesn’t have any of Jordan’s charisma or imagination. As melodramatic and managed as Jordan’s career was, there was some authentic core—it was original and seemed to mean something. Kobe exists entirely within quotation marks.

Jordan was a master of pantomime. He built his empire largely on iconic celebratory gestures: the tongue-wag, the splay-legged fist pump, the impish “Even I marvel at my own divinity” shrug. Kobe’s dramatic gestures are all either borrowed or embarrassing. After his game-winner over the Suns in Game 4, Kobe held his fist frozen in front of him exactly like MJ used to. But when he got clotheslined by Raja Bell in the next game, there was no script to work from: You could almost see him trying to remember if Come Fly With Me had any footage of Jordan getting horse-collared by Joe Dumars. Kobe finally improvised with a sassy hand-gesture shuffle. He wiped a pile of imaginary dirt off of his shoulder for a while, then added a schoolmarm finger waggle while making the least convincing tough-guy face I’ve ever seen. It was like a high-school production of West Side Story.

The Phoenix crowd’s Game 7 chant of “Kobe sucks” brought on another round of awkward posturing. Kobe cupped his hand to his ear, Hulk Hogan-style, and held it long enough for TNT’s cameras to swivel and zoom; then he nodded sarcastically with his lips pursed for a good 10 seconds. It was supposed to look cocky and defiant but came off as empty petulant theater.

I will add this: Kobe had a stupendous season. I mean, 81 points. 81 points.

But being a deadly scorer is more common than you might think. 81 is 81, but if you look at the next strata–people in the 50s and 60s–you see lots of all-time greats (Wilt, Elgin Baylor, the Ice Man, Pistol Pete).

And you also see Rick Barry, Joe Fulks, Tracy McGrady, Karl Malone, Antawn Jamison, Bernard King, Purvis Short, Jerry Stackhouse, Adrian Dantley, Calvin Murphy, Glen Rice, Jermaine O’Neal, Damon Stoudamire, Alex English, Allan Houston, Chris Webber, and Tom Chambers.

Let me repeat: Tom Chambers.

No disrespect: Every one of those guys is a wonderful player. I’d kill to have any of them–including Chambers–on the Sixers. I should be so lucky.

But none of them is or ever was a Great player. Putting up big numbers in an NBA game isn’t as specialized a skill as you might think. At any given time, there are more than a handful of guys in the league capable of going for 50+, and not all of these guys would make your all-star team, let alone your all-time team.

The greats are the ones who do it when it counts most. Jordan averaged 33.4 ppg (and 6.4 rebounds) in the playoffs. Kobe is averages 22.9 ppg (and 4.9 rebounds).

Update: Galley Friend J.E. writes in defense of Alex English,

English was a great player. Not even debatable. Don’t blame him for playing with stiffs and therefore not having the opportunity to shine in memory–that is, the playoffs.

I never saw English play, but I trust J.E.–English goes into my Great list.

Polish the Oscar. Here’s the AICN review of Hate Crime:

Robbie (Seth Peterson) and Trey (Brian J. Smith) are the perfect suburban couple; their neighbors love them; and they seem mature and stable enough to have conversations about things other than musicals and Judy Garland (I’m making a point here: if my only exposure to gay people was films, I’d have a seriously disjointed view of the culture).

A new neighbor named Chris Boyd (Chad Donella) moves in next door, and it doesn’t take long to realize he’s an gay-hating religious zealot (and the son of a Paster played by Bruce Davison) who takes an instant disliking to Seth Robbie and Trey. A few days later while walking the dog, Trey is violently beaten in the park. Immediate suspicion falls on Chris, but with no evidence, the crime goes unsolved. In fact, when the case goes from an assault to murder, the homicide copy (Giancarlo Esposito) begins to think Robbie had something to do with the killing since Trey had a large life insurance policy.

Robbie, Trey’s mother (Cindy Pickett), and some of the neighbors set out to discover who the real killer is (they do) and get justice that the police clearly aren’t willing to deliver. Some of the film’s final scenes, in which Robbie and crew, carry out an elaborate revenge scheme may hit some audience members the wrong way.

The new trailer for Shayamalamadingdong’s Lady in the Water looks pretty great. Particularly when Gandalf’s eagle swoops down.

If there’s something bad trying to get the Merlot snob, he should just raise the Army of the Dead. Or something.