Shadow and Cut Chemist

Not since the Invisibl Skratch Picklz has a local head dominated like DJ Shadow. I'm currently listening to the 45-inspired Brainfreeze, co-produced with Cut Chemist. That shit is hot, like Amanda Shaw, but I worry about the turntablists and selectors of tomorrow. Will cats survive the Traktor and Ableton revolution? Because it's all as roots as far as augmented chords and syncopated beats go, I swear.

This Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time, or, Boy We Really Are a Music Blog.

I don't have an iPhone, or iTunes. iAnything. When I'm faux-jaying at a friend's place, the thing that always annoys me about iPod-havers is that they seem to have lots of songs, but few albums. I don't have the patience to make or review playlists, when I just really want to play all of Armed Forces, okay? So glancing at the 'Artists' on a iPod isn't a decent measure of musicool. I'm a full album sort of snob, so my Artists list is pretty representative.

And since I don't have iTunes, my ability to generate clever stats that stand in for, I dunno, analysis, is limited. But I hit a upon randomizing technique that is perhaps the best cock measuring device a music blog can have. Below is a list every fourth name on my Artists list (except 'Various Artists, and a couple names that were just too long to type). We all have a bazillion albums at this point, so I tried to trim. Initially, it was every third, but that wasn't abbreviated enough. By the end, I wanted to go to every fifth, but that was corking up my methodology too much.

It does have its drawbacks however; the thing that really stands out this is boy do I have the Last Days of Disco soundtrack. But look mom: meme! Everyone play! I recommend picking a higher number. Makes the post far more comestible.

5 Deez
Air Miami
Akufen
Alicia Bridges
Amy Alison
Andrea True
The Anomoanon
Arcade Fire
Art Brut
Atmosphere
Band of Horses
Beck
Belle & Sebastian
Ben Watt
Bettie Serveert
Big Star
Billy Bragg
The Black Keys
The Blow
Bob Mould
Boredoms
The Brand New Heavies
British Sea Power
The Brothers Kendall
Burnside Project
The Buzzcocks
Call and Response
Carol Douglas
The Carter Family
Chavez
Chic
Chris Whitley
Cinerama
Clem Snide
Cold War Kids
Cornelius
The Cult
Daniel Johnston
David Thomas Broughton
Deadly Avenger
Death from Above 1979
Del McCoury
Devo
The Dirtbombs
Don Ray
Drazy Hoops
Dubtribe Sound System
Edith Frost
Elliot Smith
Enon
The Essex Green
Everything but the Girl
The Fall
The Flatlanders
The Forms
Francis Monkman
Frank Jordan
Frightened Rabbit
Gam
Gillian Welch
The Go-Betweens
Granchan Moncur
The Halo Benders
Reverend Horton Heat
Herbert
Hold Modal Rounders
Interpol
J Dilla
Jeffrey Taylor
The Jody Grind
The John Doe Thing
Jon Spencer Blues Explosion
Kelly Hogan
La Brea Stompers
Lambchop & Hands Off Cuba
Le Tigre
Lenny Kravitz
Lloyd Cole
Lotion
Love
Low Skies
M. Ward
Magnolia Electric Co.
Martin Hederos/Mattias Hellberg
Mates of State
Mekons
The Mice
Miles Davis
Miss Crabtree
Mogwai
The National
Neil Young
New Bomb Turks
Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds
Nine Inch Nails
The Offbeats
Oneida
Other Dimensions in Music
Paul Westerberg
Pell Mell
Phylr
Pizzicato Five
The Police
Qausi
Rainer Maria
Rebecca Gates
Richard Bruckner
Robbie Fulks
Rodrigo y Gabriela
Roxy Music
Ry Cooder
San Francisco Seals
The Scene is Now
Sheryl Crow
The Silver Jews
Slow Dazzle
Sonic Youth
Spoon
Steely Dan
Steve Wynn
The Style Council
Sugar
Supersuckers
Talulah Gosh
Ted Leo
Television Personalities
Thelonious Monk
Richard & Linda Thomson
Tobin Sprout
Tortoise
Triple Forbidden Taboo
Underworld
Varnaline
Vince Guaraldi
Walt Mink
Whale
Wilco
Yo La Tengo

Scenes from a failed night shift.

Someone thought this would be a good idea around 1:00AM. And it looked like it might be for a while.

"It's like sucking mayonnaise through a Brillo pad."

I'm not feeling so hot about living, so what? What call is it to drill people in their ear? I'm typical.

'Typical' Padgett Powell

Clay Shirky has come up with the clever estimate that 100 million hours of human endeavor has gone into the creation of Wikipedia, which means that 90 million hours have been invested in Simpson's-related entries and editing and re-editing the entry on abortion. This is, coincidentally, the amount of time YM-related persons spend parsing such essential issues as "should Emily Gould even be considered a writer at this point?" over the course of an average weekend.

Now, I'm sure there's a blog devoted to this, or some nerd game or whatever, but you know what Wikipedia does not have? An entry on Padgett Powell. Powell is the author of several novels, most notably Edisto, which was excerpted in The New Yorker, and nominated for the American Book Awards for best first novel in 1984. He teaches writing in Gainsville, and is held in high regard by most people who think of themselves as serious readers or writers (a suspect group, surely). And, as you might expect, my favorite living American author.

He is also, quite perversely, the reason I'm on this blog (an interesting -- if interesting is understood as 'interesting to people who talk about blogs on weekends' -- story I cannot tell since at least two other why emmers have several persons involved on their redacted lists). That fact will not merit inclusion in his unwritten entry, but nor should his claim "My insignificance is not to be contested" serve as a justification for his continued exclusion. I've been checking off and on for the past two years. And like the assumed, unknown blog game referenced above, it's a cheap jibe to construct "In a world where X (X being MisShapes, Julia Allison or Keith Gessen) gets an entry, why not Powell?" For a moment, let me be cheap.

And I'm not asking someone to run out and create one because of this complaint (like we have that kind of juice anyway). Rather, if 'write Wikipedia entry on Padgett Powell' is not on your to-do list, if this at all creates an interest in you, check back now and again, and marvel at what else constitutes merit every day as those 100 million hours grow in new dribs and drabs. Or, you know, don't. It's probably better if you don't.

Image: Hungry World, East Broad Street, Savannah. With an SX-70, of course.

YM Exclusive: Postcard from Alex Pareene's Sorry Ma

I'm still perplexed (MAYBE EVEN BITTER) over why Doree rejected this wonderfully subject'ed email from my mom:

Date: Thu, 03 Apr 2008 16:51:50 -0400
From: "Mom"
Subject: Prison rape
To: "Andrew"

God, How proud can a mother be! My heart is filled with joy.

in response to this post but hey, I'm not the one with a book deal. Gawker "Day Editor" Alex Pareene though was nice enough to share one his mom sent today. (Jake is Alex's 13 year old brother.)

I just ran to the bookstore over lunch to get Jake a book to read - he has to READ EVERY DAY for school. The book I picked up for him (King Dork) has a few choice quotes from various reviews:

"King Dork: Best Punk Rock Book ever." - Village Voice

and

"The Myspace generation's Catcher in the Rye." - Gawker.com

GAWKER.COM!!

Praise from People, meanwhile, is relegated to the inside cover.

I have to admit, the fact that they put a Gawker quote on the back almost made me think twice about buying it. Aside from the whole "who does the book review anyway" question, I would like to know also - why the h*ll did a Gawker staffer care so much about a book for young teens? Shouldn't you guys be reading loftier books? Like the inside scoop on TomKat's marriage or that Obama book?

Previously: Team Party Trashed: King Dork

It Is Friday And Therefore We Must Listen To Glenn Branca Because This Is A Music Blog And It Is Friday.

As you know because you read that book by Alex Foege called Confusion Is Next and by the way if you want to hear a masterpiece of terror that's the album for you, but in any event, you can't do Sonic Youth without Glenn Branca and this clip from a Grand Street loft in 1978, just a few months shy of his 30th birthday, will show you why. YM would see Branca at the Barbican 20 years later, where he performed his Symphony No. 12, but all we would could find was a clip from his next one, Hallucination City, to give a sense of it all went down. Wharton Tiers was there that night, too, and he wrote a piece on it which you can read here, and Phil Kline was doing his thing with the boomboxes, and I've since realized that there's nothing new under the sun except to the kids who think that Reggie Watts is an original.

182.

That is all.

Happy May Day!

99's probably at the rally or he would've posted this by now, I'm sure. Workers unite!

The Minutemen, Sickles and Hammers
Merle Travis and the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Dark as a Dungeon

You Think This Is Abuse?

I will probably write about this in more detail elsewhere (yes, I will blog at any place, any time), but it needs to be said as clearly as possible: You must avoid "Redbelt" at all costs. Have you ever wondered what "The Karate Kid III" could have been if it was written by the guy who made "The Spanish Prisoner"? "Redbelt" is a lot like that, only KK3 is slightly more plausible and 15 times more entertaining. Revenge is a dish best served without Tim Allen.

Or to put it another way--can you believe the guy responsible for the absolute gem above also expects you to pay Broadway prices to see this ...?



You fucking child.

No, I'm not done yet.

Two ex-NYPD cops are alleging that they have discovered a nationwide network of serial killers. Their victims? 40 mostly white college dudes. Their method? Drowning in large bodies of water. These bloodthirsty monsters are fiendishly clever--they're covering their tracks by making the deaths look like the result of a drunken whoopsie off a bridge! And they're leaving behind an irrefutably unique calling card: smiley face graffiti.

Then here we have the story of James Lee Woodard, who was, until today, "the longest-serving wrongly convicted man in the nation to be exonerated by DNA testing." 27 years in prison, because he was labeled a writ abuser with outlandish claims. Let's hope that the team in charge of the Nationwide Serial Killer Clown Posse Investigation learns from this. No matter how fucking preposterous a theory might seem, you know? Hell, if DNA can prove a man innocent of rape and murder...

Flibbiddydibbiddydob

Snuff - "I Think We're Alone" and "Rockafeller Skank"

Their original stuff is much better.

German Can Be Good For You: Fassbinder on Berlin Alexanderplatz...

Psalm Number 151

Trend alert! Apparently "resigned" is the new "outraged." (Recommended: Saving your outrage for the oppression of the Young White Privileged Male as Literary Subject Matter. Related: YM boys: Think we can drum up a casual pick-up game?)

Sorry, but it's just really easy for me to be angry these days, and not just because Denton's late sending out the 1099s this year (AGAIN). I feel as though some vestigial odor of Gauloises and patchouli comes wafting out of my pores when I write about shit like this, but whatever. Consider it the result of this Perfect Shit Storm of the Bell trial verdict and reading both Dark Alliance by Gary Webb (more on that here) and Body of Secrets by James Bamford (read an excerpt here, and yes I know these secondary links bear the crinkle of tinfoil hats but what do you expect from me). Oh, and also a friend of mine just got confirmation (after she filed an NSA FOIA request) that she is not paranoid and is, in fact, being monitored by the government because of some "antiestablishment" activities.

Don't worry, on Monday I'll go back to being irritated about Sloane Crosley or something. I'm sure this is nothing a few Pimm's Cups on my yacht can't cure.


The Coup, My Favorite Mutiny

You Grew Up On Night Flight, Right? Boom Boom Boom Boom*

Suburban Lawns - "Janitor"

Charlie Buckholtz, previously mentioned here as the East Village rabbi from Silver Spring, MD who grew up with Sedar Chappelle (and brother David), was recently the focus of a PBS feature. He sent me the above video from New Wave Theatre (he has a book coming out about the show and its host Peter Ivers) which I think I've played at least 25 times since receiving it. Wow. I feel so uncool that I had never seen or heard of the Suburban Lawns before. To gank a comment from the YouTube page, Sue Tissue had the potential to be a female Ian Curtis. Download two more of their songs here. A video for "Gidget Goes to Hell" was shot by Jonathan Demme and shown on SNL in 1980, probably the only thing worth preserving from that season.

*Like most suburban youth in the 80s, my friends and I first saw "Another State of Mind" on USA's Night Flight. Someone taped it and it was passed around like that Playboy with Suzanne Somers. It remains a mystery to this day, but somehow Marc Browne erased the audio from the VHS tape. Unless he was routinely jerking off with a magnet, that kind of thing just wasn't possible in those days.

Gulping down thorazines.

The number one reason why this weather is great: Floaters. The number one reason why this weather sucks so much: The Crazies come out of the woodwork. Coming down Fourth Avenue just now: First I got stuck behind a senile man making Three Stooges-type noises. Then I passed by a guy shadow boxing with his reflection in the KMart window and shouting about "the smoke." Finally--and I kind of wonder if this guy wasn't really some sort of Black Bloc/Situationist type--I happened on a homeless dude facing the front windows of the Astor Place Starbucks with his pants down, playing with himself. A crowd of onlookers hooted and hollered. Meanwhile a cop bought a candy bar at the newsstand.

Magazine - My Mind Ain't So Open

I will beat Krucoff to the punch with this one...*

Because this is a charity blog, right?

Here's the deal:
The World Food Programme (WFP) has said that high food prices are creating the biggest challenge that WFP has faced in its 45-year history, a silent tsunami threatening to plunge more than 100 million people on every continent into hunger. This is the new face of hunger – the millions of people who were not in the urgent hunger category six months ago but now are,” said WFP Executive Director Josette Sheeran, who is meeting British Government officials after addressing a UK parliamentary hearing in London.

“The response calls for large-scale, high-level action by the global community, focused on emergency and longer-term solutions,” she said.

The campaign is called Fill the Cup and you can donate here. (Unless you're Paul Theroux, then you can just save the world by teaching.)

*...and it will feel like a kiss