As our loyal fans are aware, we here at the Lowbrow Sophisticate recently acquired grant and fellowship funds from a couple major literary think tanks. We had to present a proposal describing what it is we planned on doing with the money if we were to receive it, which we did. We all have burned out stars close to our hearts, actors, writers and performers whose light has dimmed over the years making our chest cavities feel cold and sleepy. Well, the Lowbrows are here to change all that.

With our grant and fellowship money, we have been able to resurrect some of these fallen heroes’ careers by coaching them ourselves and landing them a role of a lifetime and who better for us to follow up Edward Blatchford than with Mr. Vincent Ventresca.

You may remember Vinny best as Fun Bobby: the lovable and giggle-inducing inebriate who played Monica Gellar’s better half on Friends. After his stint as Fun Bobby, Vincent got the deal of a lifetime playing The Invisible Man for 45 episodes and then the fun pretty much stopped. Vinny got a couple gigs here and there playing forgettable characters on The Mentalist and Shit My Dad Says (a real turd sandwich canceled before its first season was complete) and now… nothing. Well, we’re going to change that.

We have been working night and day with Vincent and have landed him in what is being discussed as the next great super hero series: The Green Dummy. We cannot give much away here, but we can say that a mint green Vespa is the source of his powers and he may not be that big of a dummy! So stay tuned for The Green Dummy airing Novermber 24th, 2009 on Antartica’s most watched station, KFB Channel 2 – The Penguin!

This afternoon I sat down at the Lowbrow Studios (over the phone) with stand-up comedian and actor Matt Peterson to discuss his likes, his dislikes, eating habits, dance influences and more importantly, his upcoming comedy show, The Least Latin Kings of Comedy premiering this Saturday, May 28th, at Rodey Hall – University of New Mexico.

Matt Peterson was born in California; outside the Bay area in a town called Pleasanton. He moved to Albuquerque in 1988. Matt took his first shot at comedy in 2006 at Laffs, a comedy club in ABQ that no longer exists, and it was this first night on stage, surrounded by friends and family, that he knew this was definitely something he was supposed to be doing and I, for one, am really glad he is. Oh yes… he will be famous.

LBS: So when did you know that this, doing comedy, doing stand-up was something you were going to pursue?

MP: There’s something about the whole thing, ya know. I think probably around my fourth or fifth open mic, I had some laughs, a lot of silence {ha}, the whole process, the whole idea that you tell this story that happened to you, you get up and talk to people, ya know, you go see the world and come back and report it to a bunch of drunks, I mean it’s pretty great.

LBS: {Laughter}

MP: I guess it’s like, I don’t know, sort of like a month or so, ya know, like it was something at the time that I thought I would continue to do. I didn’t know that I was going to make a career out of it at that point though, but I felt that if I could anticipate an open mic on a Sunday, it would be Wednesday and I’d already be excited for the show even if I thought it was going to go bad, but just to be out there.

LBS: So, when did you, and I’m just taking liberty here, but this is what you picture as far as a career goes?

MP: I think so, I love it. This would be… I mean there are different things I want to do, but definitely, I think I want comedy to be the catalyst for other things. I don’t see myself not getting on stage for the rest of my life and not being able to would be, be tragic to me. I’d love to – I’d love to be able to do this for the rest of my life.

LBS: As some of us know, you were recently in a movie.

MP: Yeah, yeah.

LBS: The Big Foot Election. Tell me a little bit about The Bigfoot Election.

MP: Yeah, its this awesome comedy that a buddy of mine, he’s a stand-up comedian, er, ex-standup comedian, his name is Marc Shuter, um, approached me with an idea, and a treatement or a spec script about two years ago and he wanted to shoot it that summer, and its this great comedy about these two characters, one of them is myself and the deputy, the main character played by Marc, wants to become sheriff of a small ski town in northern New Mexico so he puts on a bigfoot hoax and creates a plan to clean up all the mess that bigfoot is causing around town to show off his feat as the next sheriff.

LBS: And you play his best friend right?

MP: Yeah, I play this kind of lovable, dumb, hard-drinking buddy… not much of a stretch from my real life.

LBS: So, I was lucky enough to go the screening of that movie. Anything happen with it yet?

MP: It’s still getting out there in festivals, been turned down by some, but we’re still waiting on a lot, the festivals aren’t starting to the fall, so we’re just trying to push it. We’ve heard of some possible distribution going on right now, but just waiting right now, see what happenes. We’re having a big screening again in Albuquerque, July 29th actually, public event at The Guild if anyone wants to come check it out.

LBS: I heard that everyone on that movie worked pro bono, is that true? Everyone worked for free?

MP: Yeah, absolutely, 100% everybody, cast and crew, and we were all one in the same for the most part. When I wasn’t acting I was lighting or gripping. Everyone had their own role, everyone wore a bunch of different hats, it was really cool. We were like a family, we sat around and had dinner every night together, it was really fun.

LBS: You have a background in grip work right?

MP: Yeah, the last 5 or 6 years for gripping.

LBS: For those of us that don’t know, what’s grip work?

MP: Let’s see, what’s grip work –

LBS: Ya, when you’re gripping, when you’re not gripping your penis, what does that mean?

MP: Well, that’s most of the time. I’m a horrible gripper because I have to work with one hand. The other one is genuinely busy. It’s weird, I’m masturbating on set all the time, that can’t help me get a job either. Basically its rigs for lighting, helping the gaffers. But I do have a great anecdote about it: a key grip I worked for, for a long time from New Mexico, he’s been in the business for twenty years, his name is Mike Lamb, and hes a really great guy, we were doing a small commercial in Albuquerque for something, and I was on a ladder and this young associate is standing next to him and says, “So what exactly does a gripper do?” and Mike ashed his cigarette and looked down at her and said, “Well, we make shadows and carry heavy shit for a living.”

LBS: Before we get to your show this weekend, I wanted to ask you about, even when we all did stand up together, I never asked you, any of you, who are your major influences when it comes to comedy?

MP: I’ll probably say, it’s a long list, but I’d say –

LBS: Well, let’s start when you were younger. Did you see anyone in particular and say to yourself I want to do that, or did your influences come after you started?

MP: They came after. I mean, when I was a kid I remember watching Eddie Murphy’s Delirious, sneaking up to watch that, and uh, Eddie Murphy Raw. It was HBO back then, and it was such a huge event, ya know, I thought it was neat to see one guy in front of thousands of people makin’ em go nuts when it’s not a band, but I think I learned about more comics as I did it through open mics and other comics that I met and worked with. My top three of all time, though, not in any order would be, Bill Burr, Dave Chappelle and Louis C.K. All those guys are genius and hilarious and the way they think just blows me away.

LBS: Who do you hate? Who do you think is overrated?

MP: Nobody.

LBS: Okay.

MP: {laughs} I mean, I don’t know, probably a lot, I just don’t like the gimmicky hackey shit. I prefer to listen to someone tell me a story about what they did, suck you in to their stories. So I wouldn’t say I hate anyone, I just like a certain… I like all comedy. Anything that can get me to laugh. I lean more towards the personal story telling side.

LBS: Cerebral comedy?

MP: Yeah. Sorry.

LBS: No, it’s a fair answer. How do you think – I feel like, being a huge fan of Kauffman and Lenny Bruce and Bill Hicks, I feel that comedy is a lot more mainstream today, stand-up comedy seems to be a lot more popular –

MP: Right.

LBS: Why do you think that is? Because it’s just exponential growth, like with anything that happens this way, seemingly popular, or do you think people are funnier now?

MP: I think its so accessible now. Before Comedy Central there was just HBO comedy, 80’s stuff, 90’s specials, and now with media sites, social media sites, the internet and youtube of course, it’s just everywhere and anywhere. I think if you see it enough, just like when a comic goes out and sees things happening in life, they push that into a ball and go try it out on stage and do it and write, there is so much comedy in film and television, I think people see it more and people think that they can do it so they go out there and try. Before it wasn’t out there. There was a club in town or late night stash, and now its just all over.

LBS: Sure.

MP: Think about it too, everyone puts a funny thing on the twitter – ha, I sound like an old man, “everyone’s on the twitter… everyone’s on that twitter shit.” Everyone can have a comment and on facebook you can put things… there’s a huge difference between being at a BBQ and making your friends laugh or making sarcastic remarks on your buddie’s post or whatever, than to actually go out there and do five minutes and keep people entertained. I don’t know, maybe it’s saturated, maybe its progression like you said, but it’s fun to do, it’s really really fun and when people try it, and they find their voice, you get hooked I think and I didn’t answer your question at all.

LBS: No, no you did. You’re doing great, Matt. Keep up the good work. So let’s switch gears and talk a little bit about our region. You know when I started Santa Fe Laughs here in Santa Fe, it was after Laffs had closed that January and there wasn’t any space to do stand-up.

MP: Yeah.

LBS: And that’s how I met you guys, you and Joe Quesada and John Cuellar and Sarah Kennedy who I was lucky enough to have perform once at the show, ah, and Rusty Rutherford and who do you think? Down in Albuquerque there seems to be a lot of talent down there and the cool thing is that you all are actually friends, you hang out together off the stage, which is kind of nice. So, right now, who do you think is the tops in ABQ.

MP: Some of my personal favorites are, pretty much everyone you said, Sarah Kennedy, Rusty Rutherford, John Cuellar, Roger Petersen, A.J. Martinez blows me away, Curt Fletcher, so… Im sure I’m leaving out tons of people. Sorry you guys. James Morrow I think is awesome. Andy Harms is a local in town, his stuff is really smart and awkward. It’s just this group of, we’re all friends first and then we all have to do this thing too, ya know, I would put most of them up against people we see on T.V. and this and that, I think theyre really, really funny.

LBS: The funny thing about A.J. is that he’s such an awesome performer, even if I’m not digging his jokes, he’ll deliver them in such a way that I’m entertained by his presence, he can deliver unfunny jokes in, well, a funny way.

MP: Yeah, yeah.

LBS: Another crazy thing to me is how young these kids are. I mean, James Morrow is what, 23, 24?

MP: 23, Sarah’s 25, Joe’s 25, Rusty is, I don’t know 27?

LBS: Yeah, they’re all in their middle to early twenties. It’s crazy to me. And you’re 44, right?

MP: Yes. Actually no, I’m 76.

LBS: Oh my god, you look fantastic.

MP: Thank you…. I think, when Laff’s closed, after that, ever since then, there have been a lot of these one nighters coming up, so it seems like right now there are a couple shows a week to go to, no matter who’s putting it on and a lot of us, that are performers, are also producers and bookers because we have to, we want to do it, so all we really need is a microphone, a light and somewhere to stand where people can get close to us. I mean, really, that’s what it comes down to, and we don’t have a club and we have a lot of talented people, performing and putting on shows. The other thing is, that I noticed in the last six months or so, a lot of people don’t know about it, if they don’t know a comic or if they’re a friend of a friend of a comic, and so that’s why doing this with you can hopefully bridge that gap and hopefully getting it out there in press release or in the paper, then they can see that we have some really talented people here in town and they should come out and experience it.

LBS: Yeah, that’s the crazy thing to me, I mean, specifically Albuquerque, if you remember in Santa Fe, there were not a lot of stellar people in town here, but they’re all so good in ABQ. It’s not like you have a couple aces there, some stragglers and those learning the ropes, they’re just all really fucking funny.

MP: Yeah. {Laughs} Yeah.

LBS: Speaking of Albuquerque, let’s talk about your upcoming show this weekend, man. What’s it called?

MP: The Least Latin Kings of Comedy.

LBS: How racist.

MP: Yeah, we were gonna go with the KKKings of Comedy but nobody liked that much.

LBS: The Martin Luther Kings of Comedy.

MP: {Laughs} That’ll be our next one.

LBS: So it’s this Saturday, right?

MP: It’s Saturday, May 28th at Rodey Theater on the UNM campus. Right next to Pope Joy Hall. It’s a really nice theater, big theater, doors open at seven, show’s at 8. Great line-up, great headliner, his name is Scotty Goff, he’s actually born and raised here, been doing comedy for twenty years, owned a comedy club in Tucson, tours all over the country, been doing it forever. He’s a really, really nice guy, but his comedy is great. I was lucky enough about a month and a half ago to open for him and he went up and did an hour and twenty minutes and I barely had time to breath.

LBS: Wow.

MP: Crazy energy and amazing crowd work.

LBS: That’s awesome… that’s a long time, man. That’s a lot of comedy.

MP: Yeah, I do comedy and I get bored watching other comics sometimes, even if they’re good or not, I just do and I couldn’t even sit down when Scotty was up, he’s that good.

LBS: Who else is performing?

MP: Also is, myself and Rusty Rutherford and Roger Peterson, not related to me, he’s actually doing his set as Rodney Dangerfield on Saturday. And you’re gonna see our opener is Sarah… the one and only Sarah Kennedy.

LBS: Yeah, she’s got a future, man, for sure.

MP: Oh yeah.

LBS: How much is the show?

MP: The show is $10 dollars for college students and military with an ID and $15 if not.

LBS: And this is your first big show that you’re producing?

MP: Yeah, actually Roger and myself are co-producing this one and it’s been quite an undertaking and a lot of fun, I learned quite a bit about it, so we want to get some more big ones.

LBS: Yeah, do you have anything in mind at the moment?

MP: After we finish this show we’re gonna sit down and figure out another date, hopefully the same size, but we don’t know exactly. Late June, early July. I don’t know. If this is successful we’ll have another one quick.

LBS: And, where can we see you, Matt, outside The Least Latin Kings of Comedy

MP: You can check my facebook page. I post all my shows there and I have a list of upcoming shows, I’ll be in, ah, I’ll be performing at an Army base outside of Tucson called Fort Huachuca on June 17th, and then a week later I’ll be at Pinetop, Arizona at a casino, The Honda Casino, performing there as well.

LBS: That’s excellent, man.

MP: And always shows around town, every week.

LBS: Well, I’m lucky enough not just to know you from seeing you on stage, but we actually got to spend some time together and be buddies, so, you’re one of the nicest people I’ve met in this state and you’re definitely one of the nicest people I know at all, I appreciate you taking the time to chat with me and I really hope everything turns out for you, you really deserve it.

MP: Oh yeah, man. No problem. I really appreciate you doing this and I love you too, and if we could make out over the phone I totally would.

LBS: I didn’t say I love you, Matt.

MP: Oh, dammit. Okay.

Matt Peterson and Roger Peterson Present: The Least Latin Kings of Comedy: Saturday, May 28th, 7pm at the Rodey Theater – University of New Mexico. 18+ – $10-$15

Hey Loyal Lowbrows – you can now catch founder of lowbrowsophisticate.com writing words about words and literary art forms at D.R. Monroe’s Word House on Santa Fe’s premiere entertainment website www.thesantafevip.com

Come read Monroe’s words and support local websites! http://www.thesantafevip.com/about/the-santa-fe-vip-com-team/d-r-monroe-writer/

In the wake of Osama Bin Laden’s death, numerous journals and diaries were confiscated from his Abbottabad residence. The US government has stated it will take weeks or months to have them all translated, but you can get a preview here at lowbrowsophisticate!

April 1st, 2011

My April Fools trick fell flat today. I replaced Afshan’s morning goat’s milk with cow’s. He did not notice. Just like him to do such a thing – hurt my feelings. I guess I cannot be the best at everything. Watched Harsh Times with Christian Bale last night on cable. Better than Batman. Afterwards I had a dream about blowing everything up around me and then I woke up and I thought, Have I seen the error of my waves? oops! ha ha ha, I meant ways. LoL.

March 29th, 2011

“Hey handsome, its me! Like you can’t tell from this scribbly hand-writing. Well, its nearly April now and the weather is sooooooooo nice outside but I never get to go. The people who are sheltering me are SUPER nice and I know they’re just trying to keep me safe, but I am sooo tempted to sneak out the window one night and just run out under that big funny moon and let its light tickle my face, maybe pit ten fresh olives from one of the trees and put them on each of my finger tips so I look like I have frog hands! It’s been so long since I played with fire or blew anything up. ‘Night night! – O-Bin.”

March 27th, 2011

“I wonder if I’ll ever get to meet Sasha and Melia. Probably not. Ugh.”

March 11th, 2011

“It’s raining again. Will Spring ever come? I’m so bored. Much more bored than last month. I wish I could leave, its silly I’ve been in this compound for six years and everyone’s looking for me in Afghanistan… I wish they were looking for me in a good way though – like an Jihad Egg hunt.

Seinfeld’s on again. I don’t like George. He yells too much and I’m getting very sick of Babrak telling me I look like Kramer. I get it, jeez. Uhp, gotta go, m’ nachos are ready.”

March 3rd, 2011

“I watched Magnolia for the third time in a row… I wish I would have gotten braces. I really think I would have had more opportunities. Julianne Moore is an attractive lady for an elderly infidel. My youngest wife just told me we’re having falafel again tonight for dinner. AGAIN! I didn’t put in a $75 dollar kitchen for friggin’ falafel every night. Well, better go read my Mad Magazine. Night Night.”

“Yessir, Mr. President Osama, Sir.”
“It’s Obama,” the Hawaiian Muslimy voice says on the other end, but it was too late – the other end had already hung up.

Jack Grabber had never directly been asked to do a mission by the President of the United States before and he had never heard of this Osama bin Laden character before either. Apparently he had something to do with the events that took place on September 11th 2001 and that was good enough for Jack. Of course the first thing Grabber did was call his old friend and at-times mission partner, Samir Godot. He had met Godot in Iraq and thought Samir and Osama sounded like they came from the same geographical region and one thing Grabber knew more than anything was that outside of the United States, people with similar names that lived in the same geographical area almost always knew one another. Godot didn’t answer his phone the first, second or even thirty first time Grabber rang him.

Grabber needed to make a stopover in DC. Luckily he was in nearby Annapolis giving the commencement address at St. John’s College graduation. He cut his speech down to three minutes in order to reach DC in time. He spoke mostly about Godot and hypothesized on why he did not answer his phone earlier that morning; the students were confused, but after all, there were more pressing matters at hand. Grabber was debriefed in a suburban parked two blocks from the White House and took a C-130 to Italy. On the flight over, Grabber informed his handler what he would need once he landed in The Boot, before taking his connecting flight into Pakistan where he would approach bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad on foot. Grabber wrote down what it was he needed on a notepad he was carrying with him: Night vision goggles; two water bottles; a rain jacket; three pairs of dry socks (one with poms); a flashlight; a map of Iraq (to see where Godot might be); thirty pairs of bat-cuffs and a bat-arang; nachos; two nine millimeter side arms with ammo; chapstick; back up chapstick; a bag of hair; a turban; a full set of king-sized sheets; M4 Carbine; M249 and accompanying ammo and that was all. At the bottom of the page were three drawings: one of a ringing phone with question marks surrounding it; another of a plate of nachos and third of a cartoon bird with a comically sized penis. Grabber told his handler to disregard the drawings.

The Italy/Pakistan transfer went without any hiccups and Grabber was dropped from a helicopter 6 miles from the bin Laden compound. Grabber found his bearings, licked his thumb and adjusted for wind. He knew he had a six mile trek ahead of him and that’s what the nachos were for. He gobbled up his nachos, knowing that nothing gives a soldier more energy and stamina than tostada chips covered in room temperature powdered cheese. Grabber did the first five miles in less than thirty minutes; it was the last mile that he had to approach with caution. He could see the compound: he approached from the back which had a ten foot wall, a gate, and beyond that gate a twelve foot wall. From inside he could see a housing building with a seven foot tall privacy wall. Grabber assumed it would take about forty minutes to get the job done. His first thought was to bomb the hell out of the place, but that could make it difficult to gather evidence of the individual’s death, so Grabber did whatever any good soldier would do: ring the doorbell. A guard approached but not before Grabber pulled out his back up chapstick, smashed the entire tube in his palms and smeared it all over his face, dumped the bag of hair all over himself and wrapped up in the robe.

“Abullah Bullah Allghah Ahckmah,” the guard says.
“Uh huh,” Grabber replies.

The gate opens and Grabber shoots the guard in the face, “Ahckmah that, goat eater.” Grabber rolls across the compound floor and sees the sign written on the door across the way: Osama’s Man Cave, with a Spike TV logo next to it. That must be it, he thinks to himself. Suddenly, Jack Grabber’s obvious observations are interrupted by the sound of a chopper overhead.
“So they think I need back up do they?” Grabber says as he pulls out the M4, aims steadily and shoots down the back up whirly bird.

As it crashes to the ground and explodes, Grabber whispers to himself, “Looks like you had some mechanical issues.” The ruckus of the explosion brings out three soldiers that Grabber kills with his bare hands. He sprints to the Man Cave sign; kicks open the door and catches Osama with this pants down; using a woman, possibly one of his wives, as a human shield. “Bad day to be married to this dick,” Grabber says before unloading his 9mm into the woman who Osama discards immediately. Grabber takes one step closer, then a second and a third until he is less than five feet from his target. Grabber raises both 9mm and aims them at Osama’s head and just before he pulls the trigger his cell phone rings.

“Hello?”
“Hey, Grabs, its Samir. You called?”
Grabber is ecstatic, “Hey, where the hell have you been?”
“Out, I’ve been out. What’s up?”
“Well, it’s kind of moot now, but I was wondering if you know a guy by the name of Osama bin Laden?” Grabber asks, putting one of his weapons under his right armpit and raises his right index finger towards the terrorist in front of him, signaling to the man to hold on for just a second.
“Yeah, he’s the mastermind behind 9/11,” Samir answers.
“No, I know that, but do you know him, know him?”
“Personally?”
“Yeah.”
“No, Jack, I don’t know Osama bin Laden personally.”
“Oh, alright. We still on for our reading group next Saturday?”
“Yeah, what are we on?”
“Mystic Pizza,” Grabber answers, pulsing his index finger towards the man in front of him whom he has cornered behind two barrels for burning garbage and feces.

All of a sudden bin Laden makes a move, “I gotta go, Sammy.” Grabber lets the phone drop and puts two rounds in bin Laden’s left eye. “Face shots and childhood obesity, that’s what America does!” Grabber shouts as he tosses the dead terrorist over his shoulder.

Grabber killed an additional sixteen individuals on his way out of the compound that morning, none of them Americans. He also torched the downed helicopter just as a second one touched down chock-full of Navy Seals. Grabber handed over the body and hoisted himself up into the chopper. The Seals took Jack Grabber and the dead body to the USS Carl Vinson where President Obama was waiting for them both.

“What now, Colonel Grabber?” the President asks.
“Better drown the sonuvabitch to make sure he’s dead; I read Middle Easterners turn into mummies.”
“I heard that too,” President Obama agrees. “Toss ‘em over boys!”

Grabber received a secret medal of combat valor, the first one of its kind, and as he sat alone on Air Force One, he smiled as he sipped his Four Loko, grabbed the stewardess’s arm as she passed and whispered, “Have you read Mystic Pizza?”

We here at the Lowbrow Sophisticate recently acquired grant and fellowship funds from a couple major literary think tanks. We had to present a proposal describing what it is we planned on doing with the money if we were to receive it, which we did. We all have burned out stars close to our hearts, actors, writers and performers whose light has dimmed over the years making our chest cavities feel cold and sleepy. Well, the Lowbrows are here to change all that.

With our grant and fellowship money, we have been able to resurrect some of these fallen heroes’ careers by coaching them ourselves and landing them a role of a lifetime and who better to start with than Mr. Edward Blatchford. That’s right. You may remember Ed in such powerful and moving films as Last of the Mohicans or when he played the helpful Sheriff to Jean Claude Van Damme in Nowhere to Run. But I think we can all agree that no role was more visceral and awe-inspiring than his portrayal of Mr. Belding’s younger, cooler brother, Rod Belding, in television’s Saved By The Bell.

Thank you, Edward Blatchford for touching our hearts for so many years. Here’s to you! We have been able to use our legally acquired funds to place Edward in the role of his life. He will be playing Janitor #2 in a new webisode of The Vampire Diaries, so keep your eyes peeled for the cooler, more-haired Belding brother in an internet episode near you in the winter of 2014!

Usher was actually born “Usher Raymond IV” and even though many thought Usher was a made up pseudonym, it turns out he was a pretentious douche EVEN as a baby.

At age 13, Usher competed on Star Search, where he was spotted by an A&R representative from LaFace Records, who arranged an audition for Usher to L.A. Reid, the co-founder of LaFace; Reid signed Usher a contract with the LaRecord company. Usher remembers feeling LaGreat and how LaNeat it was.

After releasing a successful self-titled album in 1994, it was clear that Usher was going to be a hit. When asked where he saw himself in fifteen years he said, “Performing for an opressive, clinically insane North African dictator who kills his own people and getting paid $1 Million dollars to do it!”

Aside from recording, Usher has acted in feature films. He was among the “stars” in Light It Up and In the Mix. Two phenomenal, Oscar-worthy stereotype perpetuating movies that we would not even auto-fill on Google.

In 2001, Usher began dating former TLC member Rozonda “Chilli” Thomas. Their relationship lasted for two years: they broke up in December 2003 because Usher cheated on her. The world was shocked – they couldn’t believe a wealthy, African American recording artist commited an act of infidelity on a significant other.

Usher named his first son after himself, Usher V, a compassionate fatherly act of stripping away any sense of self identity the child could ever dreamed of having.

Usher founded New Look, a non-profit charity organization which aims to quote: “provide young people with a new look on life through education and real-world experience”. And if anyone would know anything about the “real world” it would be a spoiled, multi-millionaire R&B star who owns part of the Cleveland Cavaliers, has four rooms in his home dedicated just to clothing, who owns a staggering 4,000 pairs of shoes. Not to mention his superflous collection of watches estimated to be worth around 1.5 Million dollars. I think that’s a world we all can relate to.

Speaking in an exclusive interview with MTV News, R&B vocalist Rihanna confessed to being in love, in a young teeny way, with Usher. “Oh my gosh!” She gushed. “I was in love with Usher when he first came out. I was a little girl too, I was real young. But I really loved Usher; I thought he was the hottest thing. I think he was my first crush definitely.” When asked if he would date her now, Usher replied that she was far too old and she should have called him back then. “Who knows,” he said, “we could have been divorced by now.”

Usher was quoted as saying: “I’m a flamboyant type of guy, a cooler version of Liberace.” Notice he did not say “less gayer version of Liberace.”

Due to extreme pressure from the outside world, Usher has announced that he will be donating his $1 Million dollar earnings he received for performing for Libyan dictator Omar Kadafi to “numerous human rights organizations” when asked to be more specific he extrapoalted, “The National Tiny Diamond Finders for Watches and The Divorce Association.”

(As a side note, to the best of our knowledge this is an actual picture of Usher at his sons fourth birthday party. For legal reasons, we cannot say that this is IN FACT an actual photo of Usher but we think it is.)

ANNOUNCEMENT:

Late last night, the Lowbrows were called in for an emergency meeting with the Paris Review. We were flown in to New York and were greeted with grace and professionalism at the St. Regis and were given pomegranate mojitos upon entry. After seventeen minutes of gathering our bearings, the interview began. We were asked, “As one of the most influential popular trends websites thriving today, what is the absolute worst female name?”

We answered immediately, in unison, “Pam.”

When local, inner-city youth, Robin, starts stealing from the rich it seems to give the impression that he’s a hero giving to the poor. But then it turns out he’s just a thief.

Coming to theaters this Christmas!

Hey, “Fans”

As you know, we here at the Lowbrow Sophisticate love to make fun of how ridiculous and silly (not to mention dangerous) Scientology is. Well, guess what, we weren’t the first to think so. Check out this excellent link where Screen Junkies tell us about NINE awesome-ass celebrities who thought Scientology was stupid long before we did