Chris DeLine

“Releasing something unprecedented in the hip-hop game, a forty-five minute mix themed towards…runners…, releasing one of the genre’s most anticipated releases the year, None Shall Pass, and delivering a full-fledged tour with the likes of The Octopus Project and Rob Sonic in tow isn’t something that the normal MC just shakes out of his sleeve.” There’s Chris DeLine from Culture Bully on Aesop Rock’s 2007, just one of the subjects he manages to crash the boards on daily. Maybe you’re trying to identify the other member’s of Feist’s huge band on her recent Saturday Night Live appearance, or maybe you’re looking for interviews with rockers and Internet luminaries — Culture Bully has your back. And it’s all delivered with the charm and good humor for which North America’s heartland is famous. Here’s DeLine and the Culture Bully Meet & Greet, straight outta the Twin Cities.

Where are you based in real life?

Over the course of my life I’ve lived in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, Andover, Minnesota, and Storm Lake, Iowa. I presently reside in Eden Prairie, Minnesota. Having lived on the prairie though, I must say I’m a little disappointed with my suburb’s false advertising.

How did the site get its start? Its name?

Culture Bully got its start while I was in college with my intentions ultimately based loosely around Stereogum, though in reality it was just a place where I dumped random thoughts, pictures of my friends and myself, and third rate drunken poetry. There was music too, somewhere in there. I think I deleted some five or six hundred posts when I moved from my blogspot address and made the conscious decision to actually focus on music based jibba-jabba (which I still have yet to do).

The name comes from a comment I made about a friend of mine. He (who shall remain nameless) continually marked on other people for their lack of taste in the finer arts (movies, pretty much; well, literature too). One day I called him a culture bully, and so it began.

Does the nature of what you do make you hate the phone/human contact?

Hell no. Actually the blog has become a fantastic avenue for meeting new people (in real life even!). Without it, I wouldn’t have the majority of my current batch of friends here in the Twin Cities, nor would I have been able to meet some fantastic people all over the country.

List your must-checks every morning (read: what’s in your RSS feed)…

I’ve actually grown into checking a lot of local stuff first thing in the morning before work (feeds are key). Pretty much everything on my links page under Minnesota, I’m checking that first. Everything else if I have time to kill.

Favorite blog/website besides your own…

My favorite blog besides my own is probably that of a hilarious guy that I’ve been fortunate enough to have met (see question 3), Dave Hill of A Caveman in a Spaceship. A recent post is about Notorious B.I.G., Down, Morrissey, The Comedians of Comedy and Dale’s Pale Ale. Oh, and with quotes like “If the Comedians of Comedy come to your town, I encourage you to go see the fuck out of that shit like a motherfucker,” I need not say more. The flip side of that would have to be another site I check every day called Zen Habits. I am ever a creature of inconsistency.

As far as music blogs go, I’d probably say Marathonpacks, Idolator or Stereogum on any given Friday.

Favorite record of all time…

Hard to say. Doubt I have one, really. That being said, I know for a fact that I can turn on the likes of The Misfits’ Walk Among Us or Social Distortion’s Live At The Roxy at any given time and be pretty satisfied. Not my favorites, but not bad either.

Favorite movie of all time…

Fubar. If you’ve seen it, you’ll know why. I hate to judge people before I get to know them, but if you’ve seen it and don’t know why, consider yourself judged.

Favorite TV show of all time…

I don’t have cable, so it’s tough to really identify what’s good right now. I do check out a few things online here and there though, some of which are The Office, Rescue Me, 30 Rock, Trailer Park Boys reruns & (oh how I miss you sweet cable, as I’m not watching it, but missing it dearly) The Colbert Report.

Actor/actress/blogger you’d most like to hump…

Is Perez single?

Your guiltiest pleasure. The thing no one would believe you watch, read, or listen to…

There’s probably very little that could be said about me that my friends wouldn’t react to with, “I can see that….” My guilty pleasure is all that Jackass/Viva La Bam stuff, though. Love watching it sober just about as much as I love watching it drunk.

[This article was originally published by Detour Magazine.]