thehardtimes

Hard Digest May 10: Early Access Guitar Pedals, Your Brain, Jake From State Farm, Boner Pills, and More

Added 2024-05-11 00:00:05 +0000 UTC

New KORG Guitar Pedal Cancels Negative Feedback From Bandmates

MELVILLE, N.Y. — Notable music technology corporation KORG released a new guitar pedal designed to cancel negative comments and other feedback from bandmates, agitated musicians confirm.

“This pedal is a game changer. I’ve never heard my guitar parts so clearly,” says lead guitarist of Big Doubt, Liam Nostrand. “I can’t tell you how many times I’ve suggested cool ideas for the band that were immediately shut down the second I’d bring them up. I was feeling like the Ringo of the band–that was until I got this pedal. Now, I can’t hear a single one of their snide comments like ‘that sucks’ and ‘you’re ruining the song’.”

Long time friend and bassist for Big Doubt, Derrick Patterson, expressed his disdain for the new gear.

“This thing is destroying the band, and Liam doesn’t seem to care at all,” said a visibly defeated Patterson. “We keep trying to tell him his guitar is out of tune and to stop playing leads over the verses but he just ignores us completely. We’ve even tried kicking him out several times but he keeps showing up to practice and suggesting we cover this Mest song nobody likes. I feel like nothing we say is getting through to him. He’s always been bad with criticism, but now it’s completely out of control.”

Despite the mixed reviews and comments circulating the internet, KORG USA President Joe Castronovo believes in the company’s latest piece of technology.

“Here at KORG, we believe in the players’ right to express themselves,” said a seething Castronovo. “Negative feedback has never done anything but stifle creativity. I can’t stand the stuff myself. Especially from people at my own company! Who cares if an idea is bad enough to sink the whole operation? If people are paying for our products, we will fully support whatever they have to do to actually use them.”

At press time, Big Doubt announced that it parted ways with every member of the band except Liam, and that the upcoming tour would be a one man act.

Yes, That Slightly Weird Thing You Said Is Also the Only Thing Anyone Else Here is Thinking About (guest article by Your Brain)

BY EMMA JONAS

Hey, buddy. You know how earlier, when you got here, to your friend’s friend’s game night where you only know Dougie and you’ve only met his boyfriend twice and you’re pretty sure his name is Russell but you’re waiting for someone else to say it first just to be sure, and someone (whose name you also can’t remember) asked if you wanted a deviled egg and you said, “No thanks, they remind me of my divorce,” and then after a pause you said, “I’m just kidding, I’ve never been married” and then conversation resumed but you interrupted because you felt the need to explain, “But if I had ever gotten married, we probably would have had deviled eggs at the reception, because my Aunt Casey always brings them, but then if we ever got a divorce I wouldn’t be able to eat deviled eggs because they would remind me of my divorce…. Anyway uhh, yeah, I will have one, thanks, sorry,” and no one laughed and you’ve thought of nothing else since that moment because you can’t understand for your life why you would attempt such a bizarre and contrived gamble of a joke like you’re some kind of homeschooled alien who grew up in a cult that sacrifices social cues?

Well, pal, newsflash: everyone else here has also been doing backflips inside their heads at that weird thing you just said. I know it seems like they’re acting normal and treating you like nothing even happened, but they’re just being polite to you (and not because they like you but because they pity you).

Yup, just as sure as that ringing sound you hear sometimes is definitely a tumor and your ex is laughing about your sexual inadequacies as we speak, everyone here hates you.

You see, we brains have a special connection that you flesh pods—that’s our cute little name for you—can’t understand. I can see what’s really happening in anyone’s brain at any moment, no matter what their dumb face is doing on the outside or what polite lies they may be spewing about wanting to know where you grew up and if you play disc golf with Dougie. And let me assure you, every brain in here is in sheer agony trying to figure out why those weird, weird words came out of your mouth.

You’ve totally destroyed the fabric of culture for every person in here. They’re all pissed off at you because now they have to spend this party picking up the pieces of the social constructs you’ve absolutely shattered instead of enjoying a night of Munchkins and other overly complicated board games that everybody here knows the rules to already and which you will never have the capacity to understand. How dare you do this to them! God, you really are such an asshole. Also, I think you left the oven on.

Jake From State Farm Still Needs Billion More People to Bundle Home and Auto Before Dark Wizard Lifts Curse

BY KEVIN BURKE

KANSAS CITY, Mo. – The popular spokesman Jake from State Farm revealed that he still needs a billion more people to bundle their home and auto insurance together before the dark wizard that trapped him in this inescapable nightmare lifts this horrifying curse, dark sources confirmed.

“Off the record, I’m terrified I’ll never be able to go back to my normal life, how it was before I became trapped in this seemingly endless, arcane hellscape,” said Jake while preparing to be Chuck Schumer’s plus-1 to a fundraising gala in Albany. “But on the record, there’s more ways than ever to bundle your home and auto with State Farm. Everyone here is treating me very well, I’m completely unharmed, and I’m definitely not just saying that because they watch me at all times. Plus, all they ask is that the customers give in to their demands, I mean, uh, savings! Please tell everyone you know about the savings before something happens to me – I’m begging you.”

Daria Callahan, a State Farm customer who doesn’t have a car to bundle with her home, even if she wanted to, was less empathetic about Jake’s woes.

“Do I feel bad for him? Oh yeah, it must be so hard getting paid to go to the NBA Finals and dap up LeBron from your courtside seats,” said Callahan, while getting rained on with no umbrella to form an insultingly obvious metaphor. “What a pain it must be to go horseback riding with the Hadid sisters while you pour champagne into each other’s mouths! That dark wizard can have his soul for all I care. Maybe Jake would be more relatable if he wasn’t such a flashy jerk all the time.”

Though State Farm has enjoyed substantial gains in monthly revenue since the curse went into effect, some at the company have serious concerns.

“I’m worried about him,” said top State Farm Executive Aaron Wilson on his luxury yacht. “The fact that he still remembers his former life at all tells me his memory hasn’t been fully wiped clean yet. We can’t risk a situation where he magically pops into someone’s house to help them with their coverage, only for him to start blabbing about how much he misses his mom’s cooking, or about how he has a note he needs to get to his girlfriend asking her to wait for him. The jingle is ‘like a good neighbor, State Farm is there,’ not ‘like a good neighbor, State Farm needs you to deliver a message to my soulmate from a past life before it’s too late.’”

When asked how long it will take for a billion more people to bundle home and auto, Wilson confessed that “it’ll be a long, long time before anyone ever calls him ‘Kevin Miles’ again.”

Opinion: It Might Be the Gas Station Boner Pills Talking, but I Think I’m Experiencing Mass Organ Failure

BY BEN FRIEDMAN

Damn girl, this night has been magical. Looking at you now has me breaking out into a cold sweat. Like a concerning amount of sweat. But I’ll tell you the truth, while you were in the bathroom earlier I took a little “enhancement” to spice things up. Red Bulls weren’t the only thing I picked up at the Shell station.

Now listen, I hope you don’t find this to be crass or too forward when I tell you that it might be these gas station boner pills talking, but baby, I think my internal organs are shutting down.

I know I’m supposed to call a doctor for an erection lasting longer than four hours, but what’s the protocol on your intestines trying to eject themselves out of your butthole? Seriously though, don’t let my impending anal prolapse prevent us from making sweet, sweet love.

Wait, don’t go! I promise I’ll follow through on everything I said I’d do to you when we were texting. I just need a minute until it feels like my stomach isn’t trying to burst through my chest like in “Alien.”

Now I don’t want to ruin the mood but you also see the walls melting, right? No it’s fine, we can still do this! I’ll just hold out my hands and you can place your boobs into them. I don’t need eyesight for what we’re gonna do. Was your dress always made of snakes? I think now would be a good time for you to push me onto the bed because it also feels like my calves are shriveling up into dust.

I assumed the fact that I didn’t recognize a single ingredient or chemical on the packaging meant that it was filled with the good shit, like those cold medicines in Japan that actually make you feel better. I’m now realizing these were likely a mix of PCP and Clorox. When the hell did they switch up the boner pill recipe from good old-fashioned meth and ground-up rhinoceros horn?

The important thing is that, despite the fact I may need my stomach pumped in the next five minutes, that I have a raging boner. So I guess the pills did work! Provided I don’t ejaculate my spleen—yes, of course I’ll wear a condom—I’m writing a strongly worded letter to the folks at whatever sketchy Eastern European warehouse these things are made at.