Who knows what's coming down the pipeline? (image courtesy Troy Holden)

At the moment, this situation is like a 7^th grade student council election. Back in my day, kids running for student council representative would gather votes through making outlandish promises that would appeal to a wide swath of eleven-year-olds, ignoring completely the feasibility of those changes. Like “Free candy all day!” or “No school on Fridays!” or “The Backstreet Boys and ‘N Sync will perform an acoustic set together daily in the cafeteria, with biweekly guest appearances by 98 Degrees and Ricky Martin!” Keep in mind this was the late 1990s.

So here are eight awesome things I’d like to see on Conan’s new show, with no consideration of the practicality of any of these options.

Branch out in the top of the show. One of the best segments from Conan’s Tonight Show run was his very first cold open, where he appears to be sprinting across the country from New York to Los Angeles while Cheap Trick’s “Surrender” plays in the background. And – spoiler alert – his live show begins with a hilarious video segment featuring a fat and unshaven Conan bumbling around the house in a state of depression. Why begin the show every damn time with a monologue if you don’t have to? Let’s see more craziness at the top of the show!

ROCKING OUT. The “Legally Prohibited” Tour features several musical numbers where Conan fronts the band on guitar and vocals. The crowds have been eating this up and craving more, and with good reason – dude’s got chops. Please give us more of your rockstardom, Coco.

Rock. Star. (image courtesy JasonBaldwin)

More Clutch Cargo. Conan’s Tonight Show didn’t have enough Clutch Cargo, a bit where he’d talk to “celebrities” which were, in actuality, a static image of the interviewee with an impersonator’s lips on top. Past guests included Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Arnold Schwarzenegger (JINGLE ALL ZE VAY!), so why not update the segment with inane conversations with Barack Obama, Ahmadinejad, and Snookie and the Situation?

Pyrotechnics and explosions. Let’s break stuff! One of Letterman’s famous stunts during his time on Late Night was dropping stuff off of a five-story tall roof and showing the destruction. This bit wins every time – who doesn’t want to watch a 300 lb. safe demolish a car? Conan did some of this on the Tonight Show, one example being a monster truck crushing the world’s largest pumpkin. But why not up the ante and add lots and lots of fire? BLOW SHIT UP.

Integration with Time Warner’s other properties. When NBC merged with Universal, they acquired the rights to Walker, Texas Ranger, thus birthing one of Late Night’s classic segments: the Walker, Texas Ranger lever. Time Warner, aside from owning TBS, also owns HBO, TNT, Cartoon Network, and Adult Swim, among other channels, and all of the Looney Tunes cartoons EVER MADE – so Conan will have unfettered access to that intellectual property. Conan + old school cartoons = ?

Conan, as someone else. Conan’s run on TV had actors or, more often, writers portray beloved characters, like Fed Ex Pope (Brian McCann), Frankenstein (Brian Stack), Masturbating Bear (?), the Slipnutz (Brian Stack, Andy Blitz, Jon Glaeser), and more. In these segments, Conan would play the straight one. But I’d like to see the guy take on more ridiculous roles himself – he made a hilarious Conando in spoofing overacted Spanish telenovelas, and reportedly played Slim Chestershucks, a cowboy, for his crew during their live shows in Texas. He has the chops, so let’s see some absurd Conan-fronted characters. Super hero, rock star, tax attorney – the options are endless.

More elaborate remotes. Conan shines when he improvises, and that’s doubly true whenever he ventures off of the studio lot. Because the TBS show will air only four nights a week – Monday through Thursday – the staff will have an extra empty day to plan, film, and tidy up remote segments off campus. I hear Mexico isn’t too far from Los Angeles…

Beard shaving. Conan now boasts an unemployment beard, not having shaved since he lost the Tonight Show a few months ago. It’s unclear as to whether he’ll want to keep the beard when he starts again on TBS, but should he decide to shave it, he could chip away at it over time and wean us off of the scruff. It’d be a ridiculous transition from his full beard into any one of these. Especially mutton chops. Or the Franz Josef.

Can you say Moonwalk?

Presenting the illusion that the dancer is stepping forward whilst actually moving backward, the moonwalk originated in 1943 but wasn’t made famous for nearly forty years in 1983 when Jackson preformed his signature move on Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever. I am willing to bet that just about every person in the world, baring the few tribes that have somehow avoided modern man, infants, and possibly the Amish, have tried to moon walk!  Annie is OK, and Michael is Awesome!

ABC, easy as…123

Rolling Stone magazine described the young Michael as “a prodigy” with “overwhelming musical gifts”, noting that Michael “quickly emerged as the main draw and lead singer” after he began to dance and sing with his brothers. Though Michael sang with a “child’s piping voice, he danced like a grown-up hoofer and sang with the R&B/gospel inflections of Sam Cooke, James Brown, Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder”.

She’s not my lover…

Billie Jean’ lyrics, written by Michael himself, refer to a real-life experience, in which the a mentally insane female fan claimed that Jackson fathered one of her twins. You gotta be pretty Awesome to have someone you’ve never met ACTUALLY BELIEVE you had sex with her!

Thriller: 60 million people can’t be wrong!

Where the red leather jacket become Awesome! Thriller has sold an estimated 110 million copies worldwide, with seven of the album’s nine songs released as singles, and all seven hitting the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100. The album won a record-breaking eight Grammy Awards at the 1984 Grammys. Almost as Awesome as this, in 2007, the inmates of Cebu Provincial Detention and Rehabilitation Center, a maximum security prison in Cebu, in the Cebu Province of the Philippines, imitated the zombie dance featured in the music video. That video was an instant hit, with 23 million views. MJ’s Thriller has 13 million more with 37 million views!

Front man for supergroup, USA for Africa

We Are The World was written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie with solos appearances by some of the Awesome-est singers ever including; like Stevie Wonder, Billy Joel, Diana Ross, Willie Nelson, Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, Ray Charles, and Cyndi Lauper. Hitting #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 on April 17, 1985, followed by #1 in the UK, and finally making the top spot in almost every country throughout the world. Awesome!

Don’t Stop

Don’t Stop ’til You Get Enough was Jackson’s first solo album away from Motown Records only took three months to hit the top of the charts and be certified gold! The music video was directed and produced by Nick Saxton featured a smiling Jackson floating over a background of disco lights and performing dance techniques while singing the song in a tuxedo. At one stage, Jackson is seen dancing in triplicate, which was considered innovative at the time.

Beat It

Even Weird Al’s spoof of this hit was gold! Well, Australian gold! According to Yankovic, in 1989 he presented his lyric which include: “Eat it, eat it, eat it, eat it. If it’s gettin’ cold, reheat it. Have a big dinner, have a light snack. If you don’t like it, you can’t send it back.  Just eat it, eat it, eat it, eat it.’ to Jackson for permission for the parody. Jackson allegedly thought it was amusing, and agreed to allow the parody. On October 19, 1989, the RIAA certified “Eat It” as a gold single. Awesome!

Bad

As I was putting this post together I was aiming at 10 Awesome Michaels. I asked my friends, searched google, wikipedia, youtube, and called my mom.  Those were the Top 8 Awesome ‘Michaels’ I came up with. I needed two more.

Until, I got 3! Captain EO Michael, Man in the Mirror Michael, and whoever is impersonating him on Sunset Blvd.

How Awesome are all of those? EO 3D was amazing, Man in the Mirror inspired millions and continues to today, and the creepy guy on Sunset Strip made a killing today! All 3 are pretty Awesome and had to make the list! Oh, and then there is always Michael and Magic. And of course, there’s always reason to marvel at MJ’s patent entitled “Method and means for creating anti-gravity illusion.”

Now, The Pyramid has been around for a few years and few have attempted to outdo it. Until now, sort of. French house DJ, Etienne De Crecy has started putting together another slightly different but nonetheless impressive stage. Sticking to the theme of 3D objects, De Crecy prefers to work with the cube rather than the pyramid:

De Crecy has been in the music biz for a number of years now but is hardly a phenomenon yet. Definitely looking forward to seeing what he can pull off with more fans and more money, though.