Q: Are we not degenerates? A: We are RadioShack.

We had a little Yankee swap at work last week. Weren't allowed to drink because we're now part of this uptight group whose idea of casual dress is a mock turtleneck tucked into high-waisted, pleated chinos, but it was still fun and we got to go home early (or go to a bar, as four of us chose instead). There was a $20 limit so I contributed a DVD of the first season of Extras, which is a pretty solid gift if you ask me. So much so that I nearly opened it myself. Most people brought cool stuff like gift cards and alcohol but you know there were some duds, including what I ended up with: the Desk Pets TrekBot Remote Control Robot. It's this tiny Phantom Menace-like two-wheeled dealy controlled—no shit—by "a unique patent pending five-button USB remote controller and charger." Patent pending? Holy living fuck, you'd better hurry with that.

At first I opened a pretty excellent gift consisting of a bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon and a bomber of Stone Smoked Porter, which I mistakenly thought I had drunk and written about earlier in the NFL season as part of my increasingly non-beer and non-football related "beer and football" series. Nevertheless, I could not have been happier. Until someone took it from me. So I opened a super-light gift bag that I hoped would be a gift card and it was, one of those American Express thingies. I was still annoyed until I reached the Homer Simpson conclusion that money can be exchanged for goods and services, so I could get my own beer and wine. Solid.

But then my boss—bearer of the coveted number one and therefore the last person to pick—didn't take kindly to my mocking the stupid TrekBot she had opened earlier and decided to swap it for the AmEx card. Ride over.

I was New York pissed and I pouted for awhile until noticing the goddamn thing still had a RADIOSHACK $19.99 sticker on it. (Turns out the person who brought it is this weird systems contractor who recently congratulated a coworker on her wedding before adding "Yeah, I was happily married for twenty years before it fell apart." Thanks?) So I figured I'd try to "return" it and get a store credit and pick out the un-shittiest thing they carry—a real challenge, as you know if you've ever stepped inside the store. I am forever covered with every kind of audio/video cable or component imaginable until the next technology wave introduces something new, and even then it will probably be wireless. Then RadioShack will be in some deep shit. This prescient Onion article from 2007 is spot-on from top to bottom—what a ceaselessly baffling operation.

That evening I resigned myself to a quick visit—I figured if I couldn't swing this deal then I'd bring it to my wife's family's Christmas Eve party and maybe toss it into the Yankee swap frenzy there. Luckily it didn't have to come to that: it was a smooth transaction, and the guy didn't even ask for my zip code or try to sell me batteries. (I grew up in a small town in central Massachusetts and it was a big deal when we got a RadioShack. It was the only place closer than Leominster or Nashua where a twelve-year-old boy could buy Bill Cosby cassettes, and even at that young age I thought it was odd of them to require my zip. Did they think shoppers were traveling from Los Angeles or something?) I'm thankful to the guy for making it easy for me but it was clear he and the other (male, of course; has a woman ever worked here?) employee were born to be RadioShack salesmen and/or pedophiles. Such an unpleasant people, with greasy hair and cheap Casio watches. I couldn't be bothered to put my $16 (thing had gone on sale I guess—shocker!) in store credit to immediate use. I had to leave.

Returning the day after Christmas (during the pre-storm errands I wrote about Wednesday) was a terrific move. The same two masochist bastards were working again, too, and when I saw the rack of iTunes gift cards my decision was made. (I'm not the biggest fan of iTunes because it behaves horribly even on Leopard, but $25 in downloads is $25 in downloads.) Add it to the additional $75 in iTunes cards I received from family and I'm a pretty happy guy who looks forward to spending it all next week, avoiding $1.29 songs like the plague. This delayed reward had a hiccup yesterday when I couldn't wait any longer to purchase "The Garden of Earthly Delights" by the United States of America. Would you care to guess what year it came out? You are correct!

So a happy, healthy new year goes out to our sweaty friends at the Shack. We are all better people in comparison, so long as they stick around.

Beer and football — week sixteen

The game: Patriots at Bills
The beer: Shipyard Blue Fin Stout
The result: Win, 34–3
The commentary: Once again I rocked a Starbucks iced chai as a warm-up, obtained during a pre-storm errand scramble. And then the Blue Fin Stout. Mmm… as tasty and comfortable as December football against a Thurman Thomas-less Bills team. This and my homemade Chex Mix (homemade because I add unsalted peanuts to a bag of original-flavor Chex Mix, which for some reason does not already contain peanuts) eventually treated me just fine as it grew more and more beautiful outside. Nothing much stands out from the game except for future All-Pro Tight End/Goofball Rob Gronkowski having his way with all defenders and Ryan Fitzpatrick proving once and for all that he is not the bearded droid Buffalo fans are looking for. And honestly, watching an opposing team march up the field on its opening drive and then be forced to settle for three points is almost reassuring at this point—why teams continue to not go for it on fourth and goal when Brady's about to get the ball is beyond me.

Though the victory (and the earned bye week and home-field advantage) made it pleasant enough to deal with being trapped at home, I was still trapped at home. This was some real snow: between Sunday and Monday I shoveled for about three hours—curse my corner lot!—and that doesn't include the driveway, which we have plowed. But it wasn't so bad because the original Sonik Truth helped me catch up on PFW in Progress podcasts (that's Patriots Football Weekly.) I was a study in primary colors—red hoodie and blue hat with proud yellow stripe—and if the wind- and snow-driven whiteout thought I would surrender like some Bears cornerback then it was mistaken. (Meanwhile, two assholes up the street still haven't cleared their front walks.)

The storm (technically not a blizzard, according to the smug forecasters on the news who couldn't help but celebrate rare accuracy) officially canceled work on Monday, thus saving me a vacation day (A. and I had already taken Monday and Tuesday off). I spent that day alternately shoveling, watching Caddyshack: The Inside Story and stealing my wife's Snuggie. It was as stress-riddled as the AFC East contest the previous afternoon—even having to occasionally clean up after uncooperative drifting snow couldn't get me down.

Earlier in the weekend, Christmas and Christmas Eve were all kittens and pancakes if you ignore the two hundred fifty miles worth of driving, and that wasn't so bad either with Sonik Truth II providing the greatest Christmas playlist of all time. Belatedly, here are a handful of seasonal recommendations for readers (!) to track down in the next eleven months:

1. Nat King Cole – The Christmas Song
The original trio-only 1946 recording with no overdubbed strings. Taken from The Complete Capitol Recordings of the Nat King Cole Trio.

2. The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion – Big Yule Log Boogie
The early part (0:22 to 0:47) served as the outgoing message on my answering machine each December from 1996 to 1999. Twenty-five seconds is a long time. Currently found on the two-disc reissue of Extra Width.

3. Virus – Xmas Submarine (Es Kommt ein Schiff Geladen)
From a wonderful 1971 compilation called Heavy Christmas. I just discovered it this month.

4. Johnny Cash – The Ballad of the Harp Weaver
"Just. My. Size." Deeply, sincerely moving. From The Christmas Spirit.

5. Drifters – The Bells of St. Mary's
My favorite Christmas song. No collection is complete without the Drifters doing this and "White Christmas." Both are available as a "digital 45" on iTunes and Amazon. Hmm, that sounds familiar!

In closing I'd like to pay respects to Captain Beefheart. The man's music isn't everyone's cup of tea but our world is a better place if only for this exchange from Trout Mask Replica: "The name of the composition is 'Neon Meate Dream of an Octafish.' [Chuckles, strikes match.] No, it's 'Hair Pie.'" Once I track down and read the contextual 33⅓ volume I'll be ready to write about an album that once scared the hell out of me.

Up next: Tom Brady plays three quarters of a meaningless football game against the lousy Miami Dolphins because that's what he gets paid to do. Happy new year!

Beer and football — week fifteen

The game: Packers at Patriots
The beer: Shipyard Prelude Special Ale
The result: Win, 31–27; Fabio, 5–4–0
The commentary: I went to bed at 1:30 for the dorkiest reason possible: the Survivor finale. It was sort of a complicated television night, the plan was to watch Survivor live (pretty much) while recording the game. (I couldn't record both because we had free premium channels for three months—synching up nicely with twelve weeks of Dexter, and not by accident—and the DVR was too close to full thanks to a handful of the-blank-blanker movies (The Hurt Locker, The Kite Runner, The Sext Bronzer). So along with the stress that comes with Survivor (surprisingly high) I had to prepare myself for the DVR FULL—PLEASE DELETE PROGRAMS TO CONTINUE RECORDING message. I'm glad it never happened because I still don't know what I would have done.

I ended up drinking the Prelude during the show. I don't know if I've just had too much beer lately (gallons and gallons in the past two weeks) but I didn't think too much of it. I wish I knew more about beer to be able to express certain flavors that don't do it for me, all I know is it was similar to the Thanksgiving beer that was also just alright… maybe it's a wheat thing. I'm excited for next week's stout though, also from Shipyard—I picked it up during our trip north after having dinner at Federal Jack's, a sort of brewpub that serves some delicious haddock tacos but is otherwise exceptionally unromantic. (Later that night, however, we were the only people in the theater to see the 9:30 showing of the new Harry Potter movie. We didn't make out like teenagers learning about their bodies but it was fun to be able to talk out loud to each other as if we were watching at home.) I had a couple of Blue Fin Stouts with dinner and bought one of those and the Prelude to help finish out the regular season. (A stop at the market in Ogunquit center produced last week's Rogue and one more that I'm very excited about saving for the closing Dolphins game.)

So Survivor first: I couldn't be happier with the result. Fabio might be a knucklehead (particularly for letting the "Fabio" nickname stick and not punching whomever gave it to him) but he seems like a good guy and he closed out as well as anyone in the history of the show. I'm also certain he was stoned out of his mind during the reunion special. Chase is a buffoon… how he calls recurring paranoia a "strategy" is beyond me. And I knew Sash wouldn't get a single vote but it was nice of him to dress like an English banker for the night. Watching him overcome the urge to emotionally wound everyone on the jury was almost as fun as Dan's "do I have to wear these cowboy boots now or can I give them to my manservant for Christmas?" expression.

And what a great job by my man Jeff Probst, as always. (Remember when notable fucktard Bryant Gumbel used to host these reunions?) Switching to "On second thought, fuck you and forget I asked" mode after Shannon didn't take him up on his offer to redeem himself for the "Are you gay?" exchange was amazing. Survivor would be a good show without Jeff but I'm not sure it would have the top-priority spot in our series settings the way it does now. I can even overlook his minutiae-driven narration during challenges—he is perfect for this show. (I'm disappointed that "drop your buffs" hasn't entered common lexicon. Same thing with "dance for your life" from So You Think You Can Dance. "The client just called to tell us they're slashing their advertising budget. So drop your buffs, everyone—we have to redo the entire campaign. And you there… Johnson? You'd better dance for your life if you want to keep the account.")

Hey, there was a football game too! Let me tell you about football: the average game lasts one hour on the game clock, airs for three hours when factoring in timeouts and other breaks and contains about twenty minutes of actual football. I know because the skip-ahead on our remote is set to thirty seconds, so I was skipping immediately from play to play (except when the Pats went no-huddle in the fourth). This is no way to watch a game unless you just want to go to bed—before I knew it there were only five minutes left in the game and the Pats were barely hanging onto a four-point lead. Instant quickening of the pulse, to the point where I started taking deep breaths and forcing myself to settle down. If this team loses the Super Bowl because Mike Carey's crew is too chickenshit to call an in-the-grasp sack then I will surely die.

What is it with sparkling-new quarterbacks and massive white running backs against this defense? They turn into Joe Montana and Jim Brown—bring on another shot at Joeflacco and Ray Rice. (I hope I don't regret that come January.) The defense reverted to a week-seven sieve-like state and still won, just like they've been doing all along. The Packers should have been up by so much more at the half but they weren't, just like opposing teams have been doing all along. I'm a little worried but not too much, since you can correct things like foolish penalties and (via benching) Brandon Meriweather's extended exercises in mental retardation. It does help when underrated guard Dan Connolly makes the best special-teams play since week four (thanks Dan, if not for you I might have gotten no sleep at all). At this point it's comforting to know they'll probably be able to tighten things up and rest key players while enjoying an extra week of preparation for their round-two opponent. And also to know that it often snows in January.

Up next: The pesky Buffalo Bills host the Pats in a welcome early-afternoon contest. A win here means the good guys clinch home-field advantage throughout the playoffs. A Jets loss to the lowly Bears means the same thing but I want my boys to earn that fucker. Cheers!

Justified carpooling with satanic results

I have yet another work party tonight. I will not get drunk this time, and am even considering the wine route because I'm probably still pissing out beer from several recent mammoth sessions. This party is company-wide and is being held up the street at the Children's Museum, relatively close to my wife's office. So we decided to drive in this morning and park in that area in order to make it easier for me to get home afterward—the party gets out around 8:30 and driving should get me home quite a bit earlier than the 9:30 train would. Plus I'll be forced to be careful with the booze and instead overindulge in free food.

I felt a little bad about driving (and paying for parking, which is quite difficult for me to do) but the pain was eased in Revere when we switched the radio to WMBR just as they'd started a three-song Black Sabbath block. We were treated to "Into the Void," "Planet Caravan" and "The Wizard" by the time we reached the tunnel—far out! (I'm the same guy who nearly lost his shit at another work function—my, but we do drink—because someone played "War Pigs," "Paranoid," "Iron Man" and "Fairies Wear Boots" on the jukebox. And A. is the same girl who dressed up as "Fairies Wear Boots" two Halloweens ago. We are the cutest thing.) I will be in an excellent mood tonight, sipping white wine and stuffing my mouth with mashed potatoes and shrimp. And then maybe I'll get mugged on the way to the car, and as I lie on the cold ground I'll think of the part toward the end of "Into the Void" where the soloing guitar track rejoins the main riff. I will realize that life has meaning. Everything is alright. Then I will drive through the gate because I won't be able to pay the fare.

Beer and football — week fourteen

The game: Patriots at Bears
The beer: Rogue Dead Guy Ale
The result: Win, 36–3
The commentary: A. and I went up to Maine over the weekend and I came home with a bunch of beer. One of them was the Dead Guy Ale, something I can find anywhere but that I couldn't resist because the Bears were about to get creamed. (Too bad Sam Adams Cream Stout doesn't come in bomber form—that would have been a better metaphor.) Now Urlacher—who did absolutely nothing in this game—is willing to admit that the Pats are the best team in the AFC. How mighty fucking gracious of his humiliating-first-round-elimination-at-best ass.

I was pretty all set by the time Hoyer was on the field. I drank the Dead Guy really, really quickly—I'm not sure if I loved it or if was just "drinkable," the same way I'll fly through a terrible book (like David Baldacci's The Winner, perhaps the worst thing I've ever read) and take my time with a book I'm enjoying (currently, Jon Krakauer's excellent Under the Banner of Heaven is taking me far too long). After that I moved onto my bonus Mayflower Thanksgiving Ale, the one I forgot to give my brother-in-law a couple of weeks ago (it tasted as OK as it did when I re-watched the Lions game). Then I topped that off with a bottle of Winter Warmer. I guess I'm a productive drunk though because I ended up doing a shitload of laundry that night—I even remember how Dexter ended.

The game was another fun one to watch—it's good to be a Pats fan these days—though I'll admit to wondering if a field goal might have been enough to win after each team went three-and-out on its first possession. I loved the 2007 imperiousness of Brady heaving it up to end the first half with six points, mixed with the pragmatic 2004 result of Deion Branch being on the receiving end of said touchdown. Randy Moss (poor bastard) was the man when he was here but this offense is now both exciting and efficient—for crying out loud, Brady's last interception was a hail-mary pass eight weeks ago! What a time to be alive.

Winnable remaining games against three wavering opponents mean anything other than home-field advantage throughout the playoffs will be a disappointment. On that topic, the local postgame show on WBZ—hosted by historical Patriots ass-kissers Steve Burton, Dan Roche, Steve DeOssie and Scott "Exactly What the Hell Is Going on with My Eye Anyway" Zolak—presented the online poll question "Will anything less than a Super Bowl win be a failure for the Pats?" Almost sixty percent answered "No." What in the worldwide fuck?

Belichick had his first good draft in six years, and because rookies are finally succeeding we're supposed to ignore the standard of excellence he and Brady have put in place and just accept anything worse than first? I root for a team that is nothing at all like, say, the Jaguars, whose fans will be pleased as punch just to make the playoffs even as they get shot like a cannonball out of the first round. The Patriots have established a winning tradition and I want a Super Bowl championship every goddamn year and get bummed out for days whenever all goes wrong. But a bunch of regional morons probably think it was a neat idea to hang a "16–0" banner in Gillette Stadium (recognizing a regular-season achievement—isn't that was we used to give Peyton shit about?) after an unsuccessful finish. You're fuckin-A right I was part of the shrewd forty percent who answered YES to that poll.

Lastly, I follow a lot of football blogs and I don't understand what this Football Outsiders headline means: "Is Will Muschamp Another Ron Zook or Another Bo Pelini?" To paraphrase Lisa Simpson, I know some of those words but that sentence makes no sense.

Up next: A Green Bay team that once scared the hell out of me comes limping into Foxborough. Injuries suck, as proven by the fact that a healthy, horrible Bears team might win the division over the decimated, super-talented Packers—too bad. Cheers!

Bruins fans are the worst

I'm riding the train home after a night of drinking (hooray for Whale's Tale!) at a work holiday party, and the rowdiest bunch of hockey fans in the history of poor taste is sitting five rows in front of me. I'm considering reminding them that their sorry excuse for a hockey team hasn't won the Stanley Cup since 1972 and hasn't accomplished anything of significance since I think 1990 (I'm a long-time—if lapsed—follower of the Canadiens, thanks to Patrick Roy). Said superfans are chanting some bullshit that I can't make out over the greatest Christmas playlist of all time on my iPod and I am thoroughly perplexed by the confidence they have in their team—most likely the unreasonable last-minute shot of Dewar's before leaving isn't helping. Now James Brown is telling me that Christmas is love and I'm inclined to be swept away by that for the remainder of the ride. I haven't even reached Lynn yet. I wonder if anyone drank as much as I did.

Beer and football — week thirteen

The game: Jets at Patriots
The beer: Heavy Seas Mutiny Fleet Smoke on the Water Smoked Porter
The result: Win, 45–3
The commentary: There may have been a "godless chill of New England" in the air (New York Post columnists are so colorful!) but the hometown team was torching everything in sight. A new king reigns over the AFC East and it's the same as the old one, despite what some loudmouth Jets might have had you believe. I actually enjoy Rex Ryan—he's really funny and honest in a way that frightens beat writers. Boston sports-talk shitheads get all bent out of shape over supposed "disrespect" and now they'll blather for a week about how we shut them up good. Get over your cross-eyed, Bledsoe-backup ass. Ryan is good for football because he should want to fucking win games, and he says so—would you rather he got all starry-eyed trying to scheme against Tully Banta-Cain? (All the same, I'm glad Bill Belichick is our coach.)

Regarding the game, there's really not much to say that wasn't clear from watching—it's unbelievable how the Pats had their way with everything. I liked going into halftime with a twenty-one point lead but I'd seen teams come back too often against this defense so I wasn't at all comfortable. But when Sanchez threw a perfect pass to Brando Spikes I knew it was all over but the shouting—I just didn't yet know that it was truly, terrifically over.

I'll admit I didn't finish the entire Heavy Seas bomber. I was pretty all set following a marathon session of Murphy's Stout and Rapscallion Lager at O'Neill's Pub in Salem the day before, so much so that I fell asleep halfway through Dexter that night. And I was in pretty bad shape for most of yesterday until I had the bright idea to eat a sleeve of saltines in the middle of the afternoon, followed by leftover Thai food, a frozen burrito (baked instead of microwaved; it might take an hour but I'm no savage) and a huge glass of milk for dinner. Only in the second half was I able to to finally pop it open—don't worry, I corked it and will finish tonight. It's a really nice beer and luckily not too "smoked" (like other smoked ones I've had) because it might have made me barf all over myself. Like the Jets. Why do we drink? Because the Jets still suck. That's why.

Up next: It's a rematch of Super Bowl XX in Chicago. I've had no fear of the Bears ever since Brady juked an overrated Brian Urlacher out of his cleats a few years ago—throw in Jay Cutler and I expect a blowout that directly leads to the Bears missing the playoffs. Cheers!

Beer and football — week twelve

The game: Patriots at Lions
The beer: Mayflower Thanksgiving Ale
The result: Win, 45–24
The commentary: The Mayflower was the plan for Thanksgiving but it turned out to be a weird day. I ended up watching on three different televisions in three different homes, broken up by two radio sessions in the car. We were finally able to settle in where we'd eventually be eating dinner but much of my wife's extended family was there and I didn't know how they'd react to me pulling out a twenty-two ounce bottle to share with no one. So I had three Ipswich Ales and a Sam Adams, which is not better but rather more distributed. I'm still counting the Thanksgiving Ale for this game though because it's what I bought it for, and it's what I drank Friday around five past noon while I re-watched parts of the game. I thought the ale was pretty good but I wish I'd liked it more because I bought an extra bottle that I forgot to give to my brother-in-law. It's in the fridge.

Regarding the game, it was another one where my team was fortunate to be down only one touchdown at the half, and I felt pretty good about them being able to overcome that. McCourty would be a lock for Rookie of the Year if it weren't for Suh, but timing is everything and them's the breaks. (As much as I like McCourty, anyone who says he deserves to win over Suh is a total, total homer who probably couldn't name the Pats' backup quarterback.) Branch and Welker put on a clinic and the defense, though terrible throughout most of almost every game this season, knows the only way it's going to stop anybody is to force turnovers. And they've been succeeding. I'm not sure how far that will take you (I hear a lot of talk about last year's Saints even though this Pats team is not as offensively dominant) but no one in the league is as exciting—they could get blown out in the first round of the playoffs or they could run up the score in the Super Bowl. What a team to watch.

Up next: Monday Night Football with the Pats and the Jets in Foxborough. I'm excited that old friend Josh McDaniels revived the Spygate talk because the Jets will bear the brunt of it. Cheers!

Beer and football — week eleven

The game: Colts at Patriots
The beer: Tröegs Java Head Stout
The result: Win, 31–28
The commentary: Damn. Damn damn damn. Goddamn if that wasn't a tough win. It's stupid to get so worked up over a football game but I can't remember the last time my heart was pounding so badly (yes I do, it was week seven in San Diego) while I was immobilized with fear. Manning was having his way with the Pats' defense for most of the fourth quarter and on that last drive in particular—a field goal (at least) was inevitable. I was already afraid of what the loss would do to my team, particularly with regards to Brady's confidence in his receivers and the young defense's confidence in itself. I was so deep into this that, out of nowhere (due to some clumsy CBS camerawork), my man Jimmy Sanders makes a remarkable interception—it took me a second to jump up and yell in triumph because I thought it was a replay from some past game. (I scared the bejesus out of poor Chloe and she couldn't flee the room fast enough.)

And just like that, this team could win fourteen games. I don't think they will but every remaining game is winnable. Thanksgiving in Detroit reeks of a closer-than-I-would-like win. Game two against the Jets should be a win (I don't see Brady and Belichick getting swept by them). The Bears are total frauds who will be exposed by the Eagles this weekend and death-killed by McCourty and Chung (plus maybe some more Sanders and a little reckless Meriweather) making crazy athletic interceptions and tackles all over the field. The Packers game will be another shootout (lots of those this season) and could go either way, but I'm glad it's in Foxborough. And the Bills and Dolphins should play tough unless they're more concerned with returning crappy Christmas gifts. We will see. Anyway, I'll be incredibly disappointed if the Pats win fewer than twelve. The ridiculous thing is that the Jets are keeping pace with the tiebreaker currently in their favor, so twelve might not even win the damn division. (Though I was encouraged by something I read this morning: the Jets won't have any lousy teams to get lucky against in the playoffs because all the lousy teams will be home watching on TV. Except for maybe the Bears, whose lousiness might not end their season until the first round of the playoffs.)

On the beer front, the stout was delicious. I drank it pretty fast and it's the only one I had because, as the fourth quarter got rolling, I was much too petrified to fetch a new one from the fridge. Very close to Sam Adams Cream Stout, which has been one of my favorites for a long, long time. Even A. had a sip and liked it, as she has recently taken a strange and wonderful turn toward stouts and porters. What a woman! Anyway, it was a good choice for another outrageous Pats–Colts classic.

Up next: The Pats travel to Detroit for a slightly annoying holiday game. Annoying because I don't know if I'll get to watch the whole thing—we're traveling to Connecticut, and transit time plus dinner time might not allow for three solid hours of television time. Happy Thanksgiving!

Beer and football — week ten

The game: Patriots at Steelers
The beer: Cisco Whale's Tale Pale Ale
The result: Win, 39–26
The commentary: After such an ugly loss you've gotta go with what you know. Whale's Tale is quickly becoming one of my favorite beers, and when I saw a twenty-two ounce bomber in a store in Danvers I had to get it. (There's a great pub around the corner from my office called Mr. Dooley's and they have it on tap. On a related note, whenever I'm there I end up getting plastered while forgetting to order dinner.) So I'm glad I picked up a great beer for a great, important game.

Like last week's shitstorm it was not as close as the score indicates. (My boys at Patriots Daily made me laugh out loud when commenting about how the prevent defense needs to be careful loosening up with a big lead because "when you loosen your belt, you don't take it off and throw it into an incinerator.") It's always fun to beat up on the Steelers in their home—a fine tradition over the past nine seasons—and Sunday night's game brought back some marvelous 2001, 2004 and 2007 memories. The Rooneys, however, always get the last laugh as they roll around in giant piles of money, waiting to be pinched awake from the dream where an entire fanbase spends up to $35 on towel-related merchandise.

Up next: The Pats host the Colts in the annual Nielsen Bowl. It's in Foxborough for the first time since 2006, thanks to the NFL's straightforward scheduling formula that somehow confounds casual and/or stupid Pats and Colts fans alike. Cheers!

Beer and football — week nine

The game: Patriots at Browns
The beer: Samuel Smith Organically Produced Ale
The result: Loss, 34–14
The commentary: Wow. Let me say that I'm worried about my relationship with Samuel Smith right now. I had a Taddy Porter the night before our Block Island trip (see week two against the Jets) and tried to counter the loss with a Nut Brown Ale the following day. Samuel Smith hovers over both losses so far, which is a concern because it's the brewery that kicked off this whole adventure. No idea what I'll do in two weeks because I usually reserve their Imperial Stout for Colts games—will I skip it this season? Frightening times. On a completely unrelated note—since there's nothing worth discussing about the horrid Browns game—I watched Harrison Ford on Letterman last night. He can thank Star Wars for his entire career and can't shit on the series fast enough with every opportunity. I'm sorry it's not all Six Days Seven Nights.

Up next: The Pats visit Pittsburgh for what should be the first of two pretty fucking great games in a row. This is the one with those silly yellow towels. Cheers!

Beer and football — week eight

The game: Vikings at Patriots
The beer: Shipyard Smashed Pumpkin Ale
The result: Win, 28–18
The commentary: As unacceptable as it is to feel sorry for athletes/starlettes/sensations who sleep on giant piles of money every night, it's clear to me that Randy Moss is instantly regretting his decision to jump ship from New England. I disagree with his criticism of Childress because they should have gone for that touchdown before the half—Peterson had been unstoppable to that point. But Childress was a pure fool for challenging Tate's bobbling catch—it's almost like he was saying "Hey Bill, here's how you win a challenge." I have never seen such a glaring inferiority complex in sports (and I was a Sox fan for years before 2004, for crying out loud). Regardless, a good win for the hometown team. Fox's coverage sucked because they barely showed any costumed fans—sure, they can come back from commercials with that jacked-up, pumpkin-headed robot but otherwise couldn't be bothered with Halloween. Would it kill Troy Aikman to wear an orange tie to go with his orange face?

Anyway, the Pumpkin Ale started out just alright but either it got better the longer it sat or I got used to it. I tend to like pumpkin ales (Cambridge Brewing Company's "Great Pumpkin" is my favorite) so I was a little disappointed—I suspect it was more of a wheat beer than I normally go for. Meanwhile I'd like to thank the technology gods for inventing DVR because around 5:30 I had to start getting up to hand out candy. Was Super Mario the costume of the year or what? I had three of those plucky little greaseballs. Much better than the plain teenager who, when questioned, told me he was dressed as a chaperon. It was a good answer so I gave him a Twix.

Up next: The Pats travel to Cleveland to visit the house from A Christmas Story and drop forty points on a local JV squad. Cheers!

Beer and football — week seven

The game: Patriots at Chargers
The beer: Stone Imperial Russian Stout
The result: Win, 23–20
The commentary: The closest I've come to a heart attack since the dreaded helmet catch. Holy, holy lord. I got a late start on the Stout because A. and I went out for lunch and a few errands and got some iced chais from Starbucks on the way back, and that carried me through the recorded portion of the first half (yeah, errands took longer than I thought). That fourth quarter was almost catastrophic but this could turn out to be one of those character-building wins. And I couldn't agree more with something I read the other day on Patriots Daily (essential reading): last year's team would have lost. The beer was excellent, by the way, even though the bottle turned out to be a little sticky. Eww.

Up next: The Pats host my man Randy Moss and the Vikings. It will be fun to root against Brett Favre as a fan of his opponent and not just a fan of decency. Cheers!

Beer and football: A seventeen-week diary (and hopefully longer)

I love to watch the Patriots win and I love to drink good beer. So in 2006 I said "Hey, man, I should get myself a fancy beer for every Pats game!" And by fancy I mean one of those oversized singles, usually stocked in the fridge farthest from the Coors Light. I was living in Cambridge at the time and the two liquor stores in my neighborhood didn't really offer a whole lot—the closer one wasn't open on Sundays anyway. The other, though, always had a few different Samuel Smith offerings. They're a fantastic brewer and I enjoy everything of theirs I've tried, even the IPA, and I don't really like IPAs (more on that later). So I thought I had a nice little thing going, particularly once I remembered that nearby Davis Square had a great store.

In 2007 ("that season") I really grabbed on and didn't let go. I was sure to have a Samuel Smith in my hand for every game, and since they kept not losing I felt my beers and I were somewhat responsible. When I went to a friend's house to watch the Colts game (in which I astounded everyone by correctly predicting Manning wouldn't remove his helmet before shaking Brady's hand afterward) I made sure to bring enough Nut Brown Ales for everyone there. I wasn't about to blow this thing.

Despite the delicious Imperial Stout I explicitly saved for the Super Bowl, we all know how that went down. Regardless, I more or less kept the tradition going the last two years and into this year, and now I'm going to journal-tize the experience to see if any patterns emerge. I guess it's mostly an excuse to write about beer, and who doesn't like reading about beer?

The goal is to post an update each week, though since I'm getting a late start I'll be forced to cover weeks one through five, plus this past Sunday's game, on memory. Should be challenging because I can't remember anything anymore. No kidding.

Week one
The game: Bengals at Patriots
The beer: Berkshire Coffeehouse Porter
The result: Win, 38–24
The commentary: The first game of the year calls for my favorite beer in the world. The Coffeehouse Porter seems to have saved the day when it appeared the defense likely couldn't. Nothing else stands out except for Chad Ochocinco patting his future head coach on the ass.

---

Week two
The game: Patriots at Jets
The beer: Mohegan Honey Porter
The result: Loss, 28–14
The commentary: Special circumstances with this one—A. and I left that Sunday morning for a few days on Block Island. Admittedly, my first priority after dropping our bags off at the B&B (shudder) was to find a place to watch the game. I was a little nervous to interrupt the whole beer-at-home thing so soon in the season, but we landed at the Mohegan Cafe where they brew their own. The crab cakes were amazing and the Honey Porter was just OK—fittingly, the Pats looked like shit in the second half. But the view was nice and A. was a good sport for accompanying me. I'm glad, though, to have had some vacation time to forget about this stinker.

---

Week three
The game: Bills at Patriots
The beer: Pretty Things St. Botolph's Town Rustic Dark Ale
The result: Win, 38–30
The commentary: Some married friends of ours are craft-beer maniacs, going to festivals and whatnot, and they've gotten to know the couple responsible for Pretty Things. I'm shallow enough to like this brand because the labels are attractive and they stole the name with one of my favorite bands. Plus, the two or three I've tried actually are really good. This dark ale is my favorite so far, and for additional shallowness reasons it might have something to do with having "St. Botolph" in its name. St. Botolph Street runs through the eastern part of the campus of Northeastern University (where I excelled at being a mediocre student and a full-time music snob) and is where the shitty hockey team's arena is located. The Huskies haven't won a Beanpot since 1988—it's almost too easy to call them the Buffalo Bills of the Beanpot tournament. Thankfully, the Pats played a horrible Bills team on this day, thus fulfilling the metaphor. The way they looked I don't think they could have beaten anyone else.

---

Week four
The game: Patriots at Dolphins
The beer: Berkshire Lost Sailor India Pale Ale
The result: Win, 41–14
The commentary: Last month I attended a beer dinner at the Cambridge Common restaurant, one of our favorites from our People's Republic days. It was right up the street from our apartment and practically served as our kitchen. They've been having these dinners for years and only after I moved twenty miles away did I finally attend one. It was hosted by Berkshire Brewing Company, and one of the founders was there and gave a little talk about each of the five beers we had. One of them was the Lost Sailor IPA—I generally don't go for IPAs, I guess because they're too hoppy. But he sold me on theirs: he said IPAs were originally brewed with extra hops so the ales would survive British seafarers' long hauls around the Cape of Good Hope on the way to and from (ch-ching!) India. The Lost Sailor is this "English" style of IPA, and not the "California" style where batshit American brewers just go hop crazy. That kind is what I don't like, and it's most of what you find around here (Harpoon being a popular offender). So when I saw a bottle of the Lost Sailor at the local liquor store I figured it was the perfect choice for what I thought would be a difficult road game against a competitive division foe. Turns out it was the best game I'd watched in a couple of years. Score two for BBC!

---

Week five (bye)
The beer: Belhaven Wee Heavy
The commentary: Didn't actually get to watch much football during the bye weekend but I did create enough time to drink a smaller-than-usual (about eighteen ounces, compared to twenty-two for BBC, Samuel Smith, etc.) Wee Heavy from Belhaven. There are few beers as good as Belhaven Scottish Ale off the tap and so I was excited to see a Wee Heavy in a store in Danvers. I lived in Northampton for a little over two years and the Northampton Brewery (which I miss and think about often) served one of my all-time faves, "Maggie's Wee Heavy." My wife (girlfriend, at the time) lived in Boston and, bless her, would take the bus out to Springfield every other Friday. I'd pick her up and we'd head straight to the brewery nine times out of ten for dinner. I loved the Winter months because they always had Maggie's going and I always ordered it. Unfortunately, the Belhaven version wasn't nearly as good—granted it's out of a bottle and not a tap, but still disappointing. I'm glad I didn't save it for a Pats game.

---

Week six
The game: Ravens at Patriots
The beer: Southern Tier Iniquity Imperial Black Ale
The result: Win, 23–20
The commentary: This ale was a bit of a gamble, but I figured it was worth it since a lot of people picked the Ravens for the Super Bowl. Another fantastic game… eventually. We were lucky to be down only three at halftime because the defense was fully terrible. The fourth quarter was a blast, and it's nice to have Deion Branch back (I will miss Randy Moss and I thoroughly enjoyed his time here, but it's nice to at least resemble the old Super Bowl teams). The beer turned out to be good but a little rich, and I noticed halfway through that it was nine percent alcohol—I was pretty all set. It was exactly the push I needed to ride the half-drunk ups and downs of a game-winning field goal followed by the realization that there's a flag on the field before it's revealed to be a penalty on the Ravens. And then Brady's day-after response to a whining Terrell Suggs reminded me of some 2003/2004 dominance and a little 2007 arrogance. I am very excited for this season to play out.

Up next: The Pats travel to San Diego so they can watch Philip Rivers make weird frat-boy faces while throwing for four hundred yards. Cheers!

Item! Run-on sentences are acceptable when discoursing on abstract art

Have you ever unsubscribed to a magazine… without success? It's quite an adventure. My Newsweek subscription was set to run out a month or so ago and I did originally return the re-subscription mailer like a good always-two-or-three-issues-behind reader. But before I sent in payment, the magazine was sold to some old dude for $1. One US dollar. Sure, the guy assumed the magazine's debt as well, so it amounts to $1 plus (x), but still.

US$1.

It turned me off, and I was honestly seeking an excuse to free up reading time in order to tackle the pile of books I've not tended to for far too long. After days of measuring the pros and cons (I might have taken the decision a little seriously, but I have been reading for fifteen years and feel I'm better for it) I decided to call customer service and cancel my renewal. She didn't even try to talk me out of it, as she's probably more bitter about that dollar than I am.

I was to receive my last issue the week of September 6. OK. That one arrives and I liked the symmetry when it happened to be Jon Meacham's last as editor. I knew he was leaving and that contributed to my not renewing because I enjoyed his tenure—he oversaw the major, controversial redesign (which I loved until they essentially rolled it back) and the change in focus from a source for news (seemed reasonable to me at the time, since it's gotta be tough for any printed weekly to compete with an RSS reader) to a more exploratory essay format. I was excited until I realized (only very recently) that essays (or, poorly written ones) don't really provide context. So if you don't know the story behind what the writer is going on about then you're probably out of luck. I read it all and understood some. (Even while this was going on, Fareed Zakaria remained their most focused and cogent columnist, but that ship has sailed: he just took his talents to Time Beach.)

September 6 comes and goes, and issues continue to get cozy with my mailbox. When I received the September 20 issue I called and told them so and that they better not try billing me. She said no, the September 27 issue would be my last, and I would not be billed (she, too, never turned on the salesmanship-o-matic). September 27 comes and goes and I'm still getting them, still reading them and still waiting for it to stop. (Though I'm happy to have received last week's issue with the Android cover story, since I am the proud new owner of an HTC Incredible—naturally sporting the inept and amazing guitar solo from Blue Cheer's "Out of Focus" as its ringtone—and, regardless, I really enjoy reading Daniel Lyons. But then I got another one this week. What in the worldwide fuck!)

This lack of unsubscribability has forced me to recognize some strange trends. The first is that George Will is completely batshit—I used to enjoy his sober conservativeness during a messy Dubya era but now I'm afraid he would shoot me dead if I told him it was warm outside. Another is that Jersey Shore and Sister Wives qualify as print-worthy, even considering the magazine's A&E team often exhibited questionable, overly ironic taste in just about everything. Still another oddity is the sequence where a columnist purportedly writes about one topic but then uses that as an opportunity to write about something completely different. Jeremy McCarter recently pulled an elusive double buttonhook by writing about a movie (The Social Network) in order to label Facebook as some enabler of "American loneliness" so he could then casually (in three separate instances!) mention Jonathan Franzen's new novel Freedom. Just review the book already!

However, the most frustrating byproduct of the above-mentioned design/format is that run-on sentences are now satisfactory. Maybe this has been the case for years and I haven't noticed. Maybe it went into effect only after Meacham departed. Most likely, it is encouraged only for nonsensical raps about art—check out this shit. Even the writer's name runs on: David Wallace-Wells. It seems one first name and one last name are insufficient for serial killers and, now, know-it-all Pollock-blowing nitwits.

Think my graphic example at the beginning was an exaggeration? Well it was, but only by thirteen words in a Wallace-Wells world. How about this sweet excerpt, clocking in at seventy-six words:
"Many of these canvases will be unveiled when a remarkable retrospective opens at New York's Museum of Modern Art on October 3—remarkable in large part because it will be drawn entirely from the museum's own holdings, a reminder of how few enthusiasts forged the outsize reputation of abstract expressionism in its heyday, and how large a role a single institution could play (and continues to play) in an art world of small, critical clusters and long speculative collecting."

Followed soon by this sixty-seven-word gem that's somehow worse:
"The sentinel émigré Hans Hofmann—itinerant painter, teacher, and mentor to much of the New York school—was German-born, had lived in Paris, and seemed to his students the living embodiment of a standing European tradition that the American painters would pillage and repurpose in their own canvases—most explicitly the work of Russian abstract painters Wassily Kandinsky and Kazimir Malevich and the surrealist exiles Max Ernst and André Masson."

What an asshole. (I'm occasionally that asshole as well but I'm not a professional writer.) Let's take a streamlined fifty-nine-word example and have fun with it, striking every other word to turn it into merely an overlong sentence:
"The truly indigenously thing abstract was the rhetoric celebrated—the magazine, chiefly Rosenberg Greenberg, made of into and crucibles, aesthetic to tests a teleology, presented belated embrace European as world event."

It's as lucid as the rest. ("The rhetoric celebrated"—I love that.) I wish I were his editor so I could leave Freshman composition textbooks on his desk and make hand gestures indicating that he needs to tighten things up. I'll say this though: after a minuscule thirty-four sentences over two pages (!) the guy wraps up with a four-word sentence: "It published only once." He buttonhooked me!

The all-important third preseason game

It seems that game three of an NFL's preseason schedule is never referred to as "game three" or "the third game" or "I lost my thumb and forefinger sneaking a pinch of Chuck Negron's cocaine so it's this many games." It is called "the all-important third preseason game." Since I'm not one to let such an event slip past uncelebrated, and since I'll probably watch a lot of tonight's first half while sipping white wine and waiting for Project Runway to start, I'm going to make a few lazy observations concerning the Patriots' upcoming actual season—where every game counts. Until weeks sixteen and seventeen.

Aside from the obvious (big years for Brady and Moss; Welker being super-human… unless/until he gets injured again; Gronkowski, Hernandez and Tate revitalizing the offense), here's what has me scratching my head:

I doubt Chung's viability as a starting safety. Really, what has this guy done beside get drafted ahead of Jarius Byrd, who turned out to be the better (much better) Oregon safety? Meanwhile our other starter (Merriweather) only made the Pro Bowl because like ten other safeties chose not to play—I was actually hoping the team would trade him, taking advantage of the rest of the league believing he really is a stud. I'm not convinced that either one of them knows how to tackle, but people are saying Chung has practiced really well this preseason. You know, sessions where you're not allowed to tackle. I guess Harrison and Milloy aren't walking through that door though.

I really want McKenzie to succeed on this team. He's got a difficult background, he seems like a nice guy based on extended interviews and he reminds me of Keith David. I almost want him to get an unnecessary roughing penalty tonight so he can stare down the ref and shout "He was provokin' me."

I'm the only man in New England who still likes Maroney. He comes off very full of himself in interviews, which turns everyone off around here, especially when there's a humble, hard-working white guy like Welker on the team (hey, I'm just sayin'). Despite a lot of issues (indecisiveness, fumbling) he is one of the most exciting players on this team when he gets a little room. I wasn't sold on the offensive line even before Mankins turned out to be a no-show and I think Maroney generally gets too much of the blame for short gains. At the same time, if he doesn't average 4.5 against a shitty Rams team that won't be scheming much then even I might give up on him.

Is Mayo really so great? He seems adequate to me. Spikes is really coming on and will probably start, but everyone assumes it will be Mayo he pairs up with. Not so sure Spikes won't be the guy who plays every down, with Mayo rotating in and out with Guyton and McKenzie.

(Only historically Patriots-related.) Remember when the Pats traded Bledsoe to the Bills, a team within their own division? And everyone said it's because the Pats knew he was basically done and weren't worried about facing him twice a year? Someone might want to tell every Redskins fan that they—and McNabb, who has been a total hack for years—are in the same division as the Eagles.

(Certainly not limited to the Pats.) Get ready to start hearing the word "cadence" again. It has to be trademarked by the NFL and those who cover it. There's no other explanation.

(Not even remotely related to the NFL.) How many goddamn "Wolf" bands do we need?

The above list acts as this year's version of an NFL preview. I got a little gimmicky prior to the 2006 and 2007 seasons and, honestly, neither post was an example of good writing. Probably why I took a couple years off. Next up will be a discussion of the events leading up to the Velvet Revolution and/or Trout Mask Replica.

Killing a fool on a hill

[Two nights ago I started writing a few paragraphs to append to yesterday's music post. Eventually I realized it wouldn't work unless it was shoehorned in as an extended parenthetical aside, something I had already done with a never-quite-satisfying Jefferson Airplane rant that has since been severely cut down. So this gets its own post, a postscript post, completing the transformation from simple playlist essay to seven-thousand-word mess. In two parts!]

There's something about the whole digital revolution that bothers me. I've read enough on the supposed rebirth of an era before 1967's Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heats Club Band pushed the two-song single out of fashion. I understand the point being made, that people can now pick and choose their own version of what a band's single might be (predictably I went with "Ulysses" b/w "No You Girls" in place of Franz Ferdinand's Tonight and I was able to steer clear of much of Danger Mouse's irritating contributions to the Black Keys' Attack and Release by choosing "Same Old Thing" b/w "All You Ever Wanted"). But what I hoped the theory would prove to mean is that bands would realize albums don't count for much anymore, and instead of releasing twelve songs every year and a half they would release one or two songs every couple of months. And these would be really good songs. No filler… no place for it!

Unfortunately we're stuck with an outdated process where a record company chooses the lead single (which is all a lot of people will ever hear or care to own) and then the album comes out. Why not? It still works, thanks to radio stations being fine with playing what they're told and to the shiftless rabble who like what they're supposed to. I don't see the 1966 model limiting consumer choice but rather guaranteeing quality, assuming a band is worth a shit in the first place. People won't buy a new song just because it's new, but they will if it's good—and a more focused, immediate purpose could go a long way toward ensuring worth. (If not then Darwin readies ERROR 404, today's answer to the cut-out bin.) And you think it'd be pretty rewarding—artistically as well as financially—if people are excited about your newest release just months after the last one. Right?

Take Sgt. Pepper, for instance. It's a good album but not great, and maybe just OK. But how about this alternative 1967 sequence of Beatles releases? No albums or EPs, just singles:

1A. "Penny Lane"
1B. "Good Morning Good Morning"

2A. "Strawberry Fields Forever"
2B. "Lovely Rita"

3A. "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band/With a Little Help From My Friends"
3B. "Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds"

4A. "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!"
4B. "She's Leaving Home"

5A. "Magical Mystery Tour"
5B. "Within You Without You"

6A. "A Day in the Life"
6B. "It's All Too Much"

7A. "All You Need Is Love"
7B. "Baby, You're a Rich Man"

8A. "I Am the Walrus"
8B. "Blue Jay Way"

Let's compare this to reality. Between the "Strawberry Fields Forever"/"Penny Lane" double A-side in February and the Magical Mystery Tour EP in December, I've cut out a handful of songs that either suck ("Hello, Goodbye," "Getting Better") or would work better on a posthumous hodgepodge type of collection ("Fixing a Hole," "Only a Northern Song"). I'm also including one song recorded immediately after the Sgt. Pepper sessions but not released until 1969's Yellow Submarine ("It's All Too Much"). Clearly I'm no fan of Paul and his silly stories, sure, but I'm fair in realistically switching between him and John for who gets the A-side, along with the collective (and regrettable) disrespect for George in tossing him some B-side bones. But how about it? Eight singles spread out over eleven months, and every one a bona fide smash hit—a quality smash hit. (I don't care for "Penny Lane," "With a Little Help From My Friends" or "All You Need Is Love"—Paul's brilliant reprise here of "She Loves You" is his greatest contribution to the group—but I'm in the minority, so they are necessary.) So no filler, just like I said! And it should be noted that "All You Need Is Love"/"Baby, You're a Rich Man" was an actual release and that I've kept the "Sgt. Pepper"/"Friends"/"Lucy" continuity that works pretty well on the album.

("The White Album" is a whole other subject. You can slice it a hundred ways, discarding layers of excess and mediocrity until you're left with a handful of songs that are as good as anything they ever recorded. That's a lot of work and a lot of shit. Lucky for all that Electric Ladyland was released a month earlier.)

The Beatles were unique in many ways, and it's not kosher to assume many bands could succeed where they did. Certainly, record-label Luddites would never let out this amount of rope until it was proven to succeed, nor would increasingly important touring commitments allow for much recording/mixing flexibility. But it's a direction I thought artists might turn toward as the need for albums—in physical, digital or (x) form—gets pushed further behind us. Isn't $2 every four months better than $10 every eighteen? How does the music industry not embrace this? I cannot possibly be this smart all by myself. (I am.)

Of ones and zeros, Byrds and Groundhogs

Steve Albini was right. Years ago, Big Black's Atomizer LP (minus the weak "Strange Things") was issued on CD with the Heartbeat 45 and the Headache EP. This compilation was called The Rich Man's Eight Track Tape, as opposed to The Hobo's Diarrhea Smear, which is a collection of early Clash recordings. Included was a short, humorous Albini-penned essay about how compact discs (classy new medium of the time) would soon—like the eight-track tape, dig?—become an obsolete format, at which time they can remain useful for serving bacon-and-egg sandwiches. "Ptooff!" I remember thinking. "What can replace this? It's small and fairly durable, and it sounds good. Sure, portable CD-players are a pain in the ass and they go through batteries like diarrhea through a hobo, but there's really no room for improvement." Actually I didn't think that last part because I was eighteen years old and too busy stealing old-timey baseball hats to bother with future-vision hypotheses re: media delivery methods.

In the end, of course, that shiny bastard Albini hit the mark exactly. Fast-forward to an extended and ongoing transitional era, throughout which I've amassed a fantastic collection of MP3s. (What will replace those? This cloud business? Something that requires no storage device at all? Probably the latter eventually, right? And will headphones exist as we know them today?) Mostly because I'm not buying CDs much anymore, except to fill in some Coltrane gaps, and I'm ripping tracks off of ones I plan to sell. I realize more and more that I only listen to CDs when I'm doing something around the house and when we have people over. I maintain loyalty to too many still and so will probably hang onto what I consider essential for too long until I ask "Am I sure I can't just get by with Smell the Magic on my iPod?" (I have a hard-and-fast rule that nothing from my CD collection is allowed on my iPod, excepting only the seasonal borrowing of Run-DMC's "Christmas in Hollis" from their Greatest Hits. Speaking of which, in December 2006 I wrote of coming to grips with best-of CDs. Reading back on that now is quite startling, even more so considering it wasn't written in 1994. Quite a philosophical shift, as only nine of those remain.) Then there is the Napster-era bounty. Napster, Audiogalaxy, Kazaa Lite… the heady days of theft. (I'm too old to understand this torrents shit. Officious little pricks, indeed.) I can't say what percentage of my songs subverted the pay-for-this process but it's gotta be half, and only that low because my conscience has been getting the better of me lately. More on that later.

In transitioning from CDs to MP3s, songs graduate to my iPod in a very deliberate and time-consuming manner. I have however many MP3s on my computer at home, but I can't just drop them all into iTunes and copy them over to Sonik Truth II (the original Sonik Truth being my first iPod, which offers too little capacity and nowadays is used during yard work and rare gym visits). That would be too easy and, honestly, inaccurate. A few years ago I combed through all the files and edited each one's album name to reflect the original release. For example, "Berkeley Mews" by the Kinks should not read "The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society (Special Deluxe Edition)" in the album field. It should read "Lola," because it was originally released as the flipside to that single. These are the problems I create for myself.

As I prepare to sell Belle & Sebastian's Push Barman to Open Old Wounds compilation (somewhere, MC Paul Barman is composing palindromes about varying degrees of Matador success), I plan to keep (among others) "Photo Jenny" but I have to properly label "Lazy Line Painter Jane" as its album/single name. You get it. But where it becomes annoying is with old blues songs and obscure psych tracks from the sixties. For instance, I have to learn that the non-album version of July's "The Way" (currently available on the reissue of the band's lone, eponymous album) was the B-side to the single "Hello Who's There?" And then—because iPods are all fancy-pants now and display album art—I have to track down a picture of that single sleeve. I'm not proud of this behavior but my collection is spotless, so actually I am proud. Damn proud. I just have a couple thousand more songs to go through, plus whatever ones I continue to buy/rip, and if the whole thing doesn't drive me to drink a bleach-and-thumbtack smoothie then I'll be finished one day, just in time for digital music to be replaced by the next big thing.

In the meantime, as I go through the files, I'm deciding that instead of perpetuating my crimes I'll replace the occasional track with a paid-for version, usually from Amazon's MP3 service (much better than iTunes, in my opinion). It's a case-by-case basis: mostly it comes down to whether or not something has been remastered, or if I plainly want to give my money to a particular artist. As in, a black group like Sam & Dave probably got screwed over a lot in their time. So I'll give them what I owe and probably more. It's only right, even if I'm naive to think they'll earn a piece of a 99¢ purchase in today's holy-shit-we're-fucked media complex.

On the opposite end of the justice spectrum, Jefferson Airplane (for example) will be OK without me thanks to the extravagance provided by the brain-fried fans of their wretched tootling. This band confounds me—they have some great early songs but were clearly too pleased with themselves ("I'm doin' things that haven't got a name yet!") to recognize how increasingly ridiculous they grew with each album. Who the hell writes a song called "Rock & Roll Island"? Grace, stop hollering so much, you fucking Nazi-baiter! Paul, you're a lousy singer and you write about goddamn spaceships! That Surrealistic Pillow cover photo is contrived and silly! After Bathing at Baxter's contains only four good songs out of eleven and is sprawlingly overrated! Crown of Creation sucks! Singing "motherfuckers" in the meandering "We Can Be Together" was a gimmick! Bark sucks! Long John Silver sucks, except for "Twilight Double Leader," which is the only good song you released in the four years since "Volunteers," which is the only good song on Volunteers—which otherwise sucks—and is the only good song you released in the two years since After Bathing at Baxter's, which, again, is overrated! Six people in a rock band is absurd! Shut up, Grace!

Pardon me. I last posted a music-in-review list back in January 2007. (Beyoncé was atop the charts with "Irreplaceable," a song I'd never heard until I just now listened to thirty seconds on iTunes. On its album cover she has the blank look of someone who would release a song called "Irreplaceable" as a single.) So "this year's" list covers from then to now. Of course, it doesn't consist solely of songs released since then, but new and old stuff that's turned my screw along the way. And, because we live in a world of TMZ this and sexting that, I'm not going to limit myself to a traditional eighty minutes of CD-fitting music like I did before. I'll just keep adding until I'm satisfied, and make an effort to fit everything together in some imagined chemistry. Let's just see how it all shakes out in terms of length—it's never easy to halt a frenzy. [Edit, after the fact: I have clearly created a boxed set rather than a simple playlist. Will boxed sets exist in the future? Will boxes?] Honestly, a good long playlist is nice to have if you're stuck in Cape traffic or your spouse is watching a Property Virgins marathon in the other room. I'll try to not get too carried away about each pick, randomly dumping all over reggae and assaulting artists with my word-fists and stuff. Anyway… god save these frightening new times!

---

1. 13th Floor Elevators – Livin' On
From 1969's Bull of the Woods. I hate to be the guy who starts with a side-one-track-one but, dammit, some side-one-track-ones actually deserve to be side-one-track-ones. This has the perfect introduction to kick everything off—usually I'd choose something with a slower/longer buildup, in order to generate a mood or atmosphere, but this simple riff (the best ones are always simple) lays it all down in only six seconds before the vocals kick in. The horns remind me of the arrangements that were layered onto the Pretty Things' Emotions after the band thought they'd completed it. Since Woods was recorded and assembled in a haphazard way, I'm guessing the record company wanted to similarly "spruce things up" with some session hackery, but I like the effect. The lesson here: always submit to authority.

2. Black Mountain – Bicycle Man
What a rip-off! I don't care. If the Jam can go all Sean Puffy Diddy on "Taxman" then I won't fault anyone for redoing "No Fun." It even has a little saxophone straight out of Fun House. Don't worry, though, Iggy gets his revenge later. Anyway, I've got In the Future on CD and I almost went with "Tyrants" here until I remembered my implied rule about choosing only from my digital collection. I'm not going to make a conscious effort to include more women this year (2007's was pretty bad) but I hope I do a better job this time. The co-vocalist here helps, at least. Last time I incorrectly assumed a female backup vocalist on a Dead Meadow song and got yelled at by some dickless turd who didn't even have a blog I could visit and pick apart. "That's no woman doing backing vocals. That's Jason Simon." I seen this band on the TV so go pull your pud some more. Anyway, I'm trying to present a bit of a rollercoaster ride here, ups and downs, loose lap-belt anxiety, bare breasts for the still-cam. A good chunky rocker fit here to get the ride moving.

3. Ant Trip Ceremony – Pale Shades of Gray
And then Ant Trip Ceremony slowly drags you up the terrifying first hill. I always wish I would allow myself to enjoy the view… OK, enough with the rollercoaster shit. How far could I even have gone with that? Like, when I get to Ya Ho Wa 13 would that represent the googly-eyed park custodian who paws through people's barf looking for gold fillings? And then Royal Trux is when you're blocked from leaving the parking lot by an old sedan with a failed inspection sticker on the front and a DRILL BABY DRILL bumper sticker on the back? I think so. Maybe I should keep this up after all. (Nah.) Ant Trip Ceremony is one of those I discovered from Technicolor Web of Sound. What an amazing band. 24 Hours sounds like it was recorded in a well. I drink from that well.

4. Amnesty – Love Fades
Somehow this album (Free Your Mind and Your Ass Will Follow) came out in 2007. If you told me Amnesty used to hang with Tower of Power in '73 I'd believe you. Maybe they did, and this is a reissue of some old record? I'm too lazy to look it up.

5. Groundhogs – Split (Part 2)
Part of a side-long suite from the 1971 album Split. (I'll talk about suites later on.) My man George Brigman dug these guys and I do too. It's funny how many great defunct bands there are that I'd never heard of until the past few years. Makes me wonder (and look forward to) what I'll be uncovering in the next few.

6. Elliott Smith – Rose Parade
Let me start by saying I am not pandering to A. by including an Elliott Smith song—he's her boy. (She won't read this for a few months anyway, and by then I'll be writing of the frustration in locating usable JPGs of early Status Quo singles.) Not that I have any idea what I'm talking about, but I think Elliott is an enormously gifted guitar player. No one else really sounds like him. So I thought it was fitting to slot him after acknowledged guitar hero Tony McPhee from the Groundhogs. I know, I know, "Rose Parade" doesn't do much to emphasize his playing skills, but it's a beautiful song. At least I hope it is, because I don't pay attention to lyrics. Sounds nice, though. Except for the part about being "the only shit that's left behind." Maybe not so nice.

7. The Pentangle – Sally Free and Easy
Bert Jansch is a name I hear every now and then but I don't know much about him. I think I read a Mojo article once—maybe I should read it again and then dig a bit deeper. "Sally Free and Easy" is the one Pentangle song that TWOS plays. It is gorgeous.

8. Gil Scott-Heron – Whitey on the Moon (Live)
"It was inspired by some whiteys on the moon." How about the audience member who spoils the last punchline? I know, it's not really a punchline because he's saying it throughout the performance, but just sit tight, lady. The protracted silence following her interruption, as if he's giving her a good "I'll put your dumb ass on the moon" glare, is priceless.

9. Russell Morris – The Real Thing
I could write an essay about the wonder of this song but it would take me six months. Everything takes me six months nowadays, the way everything Girls Against Boys does seems to cost them twenty dollars. This might be the best thing Australia has ever produced, and that's not a knock on Australia because I'd be saying the same thing if Morris were American. The continuation of this song, "Into Paper Walls," is nearly as essential, but "The Real Thing" might just change your life.

10. People Under the Stairs – San Francisco Knights
I had to throw in a pun title because I hate puns so much and yet I have a knack with them. Curse my wit! I know the original "San Franciscan Nights" by the Animals, when Eric Burdon was going through an extended California-is-beautiful phase, but it's a different version sampled here for "Knights." Speaking of which, I can't recommend Who Sampled and Second Hand Songs enough if you're into shit like sample sources and cover versions, respectively.

11. Byrds – Eight Miles High
Since I've decided against including any Coltrane (or jazz at all, but jazz usually comes down to Coltrane for me) I'm choosing a song reputedly influenced by the man himself. Considering it's a mid-sixties pop band best known for covering Dylan I think they did a pretty good job. McGuinn even has a recurring theme and some passable sheets of sound going for him. The Byrds are one of those rare bands who tried a bunch of different shit, and good for them that most of it stuck. (I don't like their country-ish stuff but I generally don't like country music, so that tells me they probably nailed it.) Still, with all the great music they produced up through The Notorious Byrd Brothers in early '68, it will always be the Gene Clark era that does it for me.

12. Stooges – Penetration
So I have Iggy's remix of Raw Power on CD (of course) and I just picked up the double-disc remaster of Bowie's original mix. I plan to rip that one to my iPod and then sell it (sorry boys). I think it's the perfect compromise: Iggy's mix is better when played loudly in your living room and Bowie's mix is better on headphones. So that's how I justify owning two versions of the same album. With "Penetration," there seems to be a little less going on in this Bowie mix (most notably the buried xylophone) but it feels darker. Side note: hammered home in the live Georgia Peaches set included with this reissue (as well as on Metallic KO/Metallic 2xKO) is the fact that piano player Scott Thurston might be the most farcical backup singer ever.

13. John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers – Another Kinda Love
Aynsley Dunbar must be a superior asshole. This guy was in and out of so many bands his Wikipedia page reads like a white baby boomer's wet dream. Aside from some top work with John Mayall (he plays on this track from A Hard Road) my favorite thing of his has to be 1968's "Warning" by the Aynsley Dunbar Retaliation, a great song made even better when covered on Black Sabbath's first album a year or so later.

14. Can – Uphill
You know what's harder than going uphill? Listening to a humongous playlist at the office, pausing your work every few minutes to jot down brilliant insights into what you've just heard. It's like my softball game last week where I kept on crushing the ball (or at least hitting it away from fielders) and it seemed I was constantly running the bases. Toward the end I seriously contemplated making an out on purpose just to get a breather. Plus, I had to cut off the beer until afterward because I can't run for shit and I was slogging around enough on my own. Anyway, this playlist business is a lot like that. I want to quit, but I'm too good. Moving uphill. Going slowly. (But moving nonetheless.)

15. Dragonfly – Blue Monday
"Oh… my god." Thus begins "Blue Monday," another gem I first heard on TWOS. It's much better than it reads, sounding like the dude just witnessed his own death at the hands of an angry diarrhea-covered hobo. As with Ant Trip Ceremony's 24 Hours, I can't recommend Dragonfly enough. And they're both from 1968. Of course they are!

16. Madvillain – Strange Ways
Not a whole lot of rap so far. Not much more after this either. It's a challenge to make rap songs work on mixes—transitions of anything into and out of rap are difficult to get right. Anyway, I remember reading all this great press about Madvillainy when it came out, and I loved the album cover, but I only thought to check it out a couple of years ago. I bought a few songs and they're good so I'll probably buy more. Gentle Giant's "Funny Ways" sounds a little sped up but it's already plenty weird on its own.

17. Dungen – Bortglömd
I got into these guys when "Sätt Att Se" from the album 4 was available as a free download somewhere a couple of years ago. "Bortglömd" wallops you right away and ends too soon. In general, the singer's voice might take some getting used to. But it's worth the time, particularly if you're wondering what mainstream progressive music could have become outside of Keith Emerson, Jeff Lynne and Rick Wakeman going all keyboardy batshit. My Swedish friends at Wikipedia tell me the title of this translates to either "Forgotten" or "Neglected." I find that hard to believe because umlauts are nothing if not triumphant.

18. Pink Floyd – Wot's… Uh, the Deal?
I'll pit early Pink Floyd (up through Obscured by Clouds, where this song lives outside of ridiculously self-indulgent three-hour playlists) against any of their contemporaries and choose the Floyd almost every time. The Stones and the Kinks were consistently better from '67 to '72… who else? [In retrospect, I can't think of any band beside these three whose career spanned '67 to '72. My bad. But shit, I even like Animals.]

19. Shadows of Knight – Someone Like Me
"Hey!" Infectious—these guys sneak up on you every time. They are good and it's odd that you don't hear more about them. They never get airplay, except in The Underground Garage and in niche college shows like WZBC's Psychotic Reactions and WMBR's Lost and Found. They had a couple of hits and showed up in the Nuggets series a few times. They could also out-Yardbird the Yardbirds when they wanted to. So I've given them a bunch of my money.

20. Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings – What Have You Done for Me Lately?
Uh-oh, still some shameful misogyny all up in here. Better start representing. But seriously, don't ninety-nine percent of female singers sing about men? Not so much about pestilence and milky cereal. And these men they're going on about, they're either sweethearts or dogs. And wouldn't you know it, Sharon Jones is singing about a no-good dog! It's like I set myself up, I do cursory research for one-sided evidence and then I prove myself correct in my own forum. It's the oldest story.

21. Camera Obscura – If Looks Could Kill
Not a Heart cover. It only took me an hour or so to get to an honest-to-goodness pop song. It's impossible to resist "If Looks Could Kill," just like it is the Crüe's "Looks That Kill." Appears I've found me a formula, baby.

22. Aliens – Magic Man
Also not a Heart cover. I added "Magic Man" after hearing it on my iPod on the way home from work the other day. I think you'll agree one more "fun" song was needed, particularly because it sets up a little Scottish block alongside Camera Obscura. "Magic Man" should appeal to the kids who don't get the whole Lady Gaga thing but still want to bob their heads.

23. Jay Reatard – It Ain't Gonna Save Me
I had his Watch Me Fall as the best of 2009 in a pointless post from January before dropping it in favor of the Flaming Lips, and then Jay Reatard went and died. But he doesn't give a shit so it's cool. He'll be missed by people who like to buy a bunch of singles only to see them all compiled a year later.

24. Sir Lord Baltimore – Hell Hound
Hey, I always require at least one ridiculous song in the bunch. Riffage! I luuuurrrve this song, and the entire Kingdom Come album. "Woman is a hell hound!" Another standout pronounces "woman, you are the master heartache." That one is called "Master Heartache." You get the idea. I wrote recently that Sir Lord Baltimore is the only good rock band to come out of Brooklyn and a steady stream of soulless no-talent It bands continues to prove me right.

25. Kills – U R A Fever
This is the type of band I usually resent on principle. Can't look cool enough on the album cover, over-stylized breathy trade-off vocals and what I suspect is a "DIY" sound that took them weeks to achieve. But… what happens if I actually do like this song? Am I bamboozled?

26. Loop – Too Real to Feel
Though I did pony up and download some legal Spacemen 3 and Jesus & Mary Chain in the last year or so, I'm choosing Loop to represent the eighties wall-of-guitars genre. Found these guys at Anthology Recordings, who sold this to me for 98¢ instead of 99¢ on iTunes. Up yours, Steve!

27. Automator – Cartoon Capers
Who knows how many pseudonyms guest MC Kool Keith has had over the years, but I've got to give it up for "Sinister 6000." It might be my favorite. The hilarious, engrossing "Cartoon Capers" is from the expanded "much better" reissue of Automator's A Better Tomorrow EP, a quasi-collaborative project that led directly to Dr. Octagon later the same year (no bumbling Sir Menelik accompaniment here though). How did it take until '96 for someone to cast Skeletor as a crime boss?

28. Lee Hazlewood/Ann-Margret – It's a Nice World to Visit (but Not to Live In)
I don't know if the guitar is so distorted on purpose or if it was just poorly recorded (or preserved). I wouldn't change a thing. Hazlewood's collaborations with Nancy Sinatra get all the attention (and they should, because "Some Velvet Morning" and "Summer Wine" are luscious) but don't overlook this one (sans Hazlewood vocals, though). Ann-Margret tries to sound tougher than she is and doesn't quite pull it off, but even that works.

29. Junior Kimbrough – Meet Me in the City
One lo-fi song follows another. iTunes says "Meet Me in the City" is from a "noisy and hazy-sounding" 1992 home recording. I respond "Screw you, I downloaded it for free from the Fat Possum site." What's with all the iTunes rage?

30. Whyte Boots – Nightmare
A message to anyone who has tried to develop drama in pop music: you will never, ever top this song. It packs all the tragedy of opera into 2:45 and makes "Leader of the Pack" sound like a Cream of Wheat jingle. I love the Greek chorus effect, and the bird-like "Ohhhhhh! Ohhhh! Ohhhh!" at the climax gives me the chills every time. "It's all my fault she's dead." A goddamn masterpiece.

31. Chain & the Gang – Interview With the Chain Gang
Had to lighten the mood after what happened with Bobby's former and current (well, now former) girlfriends. Everything Ian Svenonius records makes me laugh ("Diary of a Genius," anyone?). Perfect mixture of genuine (I think) political/artistic values and an ability to make fun of himself. "What's my stance? You know, I like to dance." Gold. For no reason at all I'll note that this is the second telephone-sound-effect song after "U R A Fever." Will somebody answer that damn phone?

32. Six Finger Satellite – Half Control
Frequent readers (!) know how much I like Six Finger Satellite. I'll try to keep my pants on. The new/old/awesome Half Control (recorded in 2001 but only released last year) is still in my regular rotation. (The real new one, A Good Year for Hardness, is good too but not as consistent.) Hot title track action!

33. Mr. Lif – Welcome to the World
I think it's pretty cool that my two favorite rappers (Lif and Edan) are from Boston. Not that I live in Boston anymore. Don't you love when you meet people at Clark's Trading Post in New Hampshire who say they're from "Boston" but when you ask what "part of town" they live in they tell you Melrose or something? I don't necessarily blame those who hate people from Massachusetts.

34. Ofege – It's Not Easy
I snagged this on eMusic from the Forge Your Own Chains compilation. One of the reviewers called it "an irresistible swirl" of "Hey Jude" and "Oh! Sweet Nuthin'" and I have to say that's pretty spot-on. I'll throw in "Dear Mr. Fantasy" too, because I'm a Traffic dork.

35. Shocking Blue – Send Me a Postcard
I think "Send Me a Postcard" was in a movie I saw recently. I had a hard time deciding between it and "Love Buzz," but I didn't want all my readers (!) to think I chose that one in a bald attempt to show off. "Ever hear of a little band called Nirvana? Their first single was a Shocking Blue cover. Also, give a listen to 'Rainbow Chaser' by the original Nirvana. 1968. You're welcome." Asshole.

36. Rocket From the Tombs – Transfusion (Demo)
I could have chosen anything from The Day the Earth Met the Rocket From the Tombs. It's one of the best things I've bought all my life. Members went on to form Pere Ubu and the Dead Boys, but the original RFTT rehearsals ("Sonic Reducer," "30 Seconds Over Tokyo," etc.) smoke the official later recordings.

37. Funkadelic – I Wanna Know If It's Good to You?
I put a shortened version of this song (from a comp I had called In Yo' Face! The History of Funk, Vol. 1) on a college mixtape of "oldies" called I Am a Tired Old Woman, but the album version is one hundred percent better—basically the "Part 1" single and its "Part 2" B-side grafted together with some extra stereo effects added in. Anyway, I have a distinct memory of listening to this song while cruising down Storrow Drive on my way home from work one night years ago. When I got home I probably opened a Harp, put on some Blues Explosion and played Dark Forces II: Jedi Knight on my PC. I was a real winner.

38. Ya Ho Wa 13 – Camp of the Gypsies
Welcome to the weird block. It helps to have blocks when dealing with this many songs. Every time I see the Magnificence in the Memory cover I fear the picture of Father Yod is a cock. I'm sorry about that. He is intercoursing a woman on the front of I'm Gonna Take You Home though, so don't think it's out of nowhere. Probably not an accident, either.

39. The Red Krayola – The Jewels of the Madonna
I like that these guys changed the spelling of "Crayola" under legal pressure from the crayon company, and then eventually said "Fuck it" and went back to the C. I also love how the (totally shitty-sounding) two-fer CD of their first two albums mistakenly calls the second one God Bless the Red Krayola and All Who Sail on Her (instead of …With It). Must have been a navy man done that.

40. Amon Düül II – Archangel Thunderbird
Remember when we were bouncing around to Camera Obscura? We've come a long way, baby. Amon Düül II is what happens when you're browsing eMusic for psychedelic music—it's like shopping for aspirin at Target and going home with a case of glue.

41. The Olivia Tremor Control – Green Typewriters (Part 1)
Weird block over. Maybe? I like this band but I suspect they're strange for strangeness's sake. This song is taken from Dusk at Cubist Castle, where it's part of a ten-song "Green Typewriters" suite. Only it's not "Green Typewriters (Part 1)," "Green Typewriters (Part 2)," etc. Each part is just called "Green Typewriters." Why? Just to be annoying? If it's so important that "They're all part of one big piece, man" then just make it one long track, man. I have their later (really good) album Black Foliage on CD and it's a good thing, because even though silly little "songs" like the four-second "The Sky Is a Harpsichord Canvas" are necessary (in that the tracks all run into each other) it would drive me nuts every time one of them popped up on shuffle on an iPod. There are only so many times you can elect to skip stuff when shuffling before you wonder why you shouldn't just delete that shit. If they produced a series of short tracks called "I Am Collecting Mad Royalties" then maybe I'd understand.

42. Royal Trux – The United States vs. One 1974 Cadillac El Dorado Sedan
For some reason you can't download much Royal Trux. The self-explanatory 3-Song EP is excellent, especially for $3 on Amazon. And yes, "The United States vs. One 1974 Cadillac El Dorado Sedan" is as good as the title suggests—basically four minutes of straightforward Royal Trux and three of spacey Royal Trux. The result? My favorite Royal Trux song.

43. UFO – Evil
The last song I added. I can't believe I almost forgot about it—"Evil" got me thinking about the whole digital thing in the first place. I first heard it about a year and a half ago, parked outside the condo A. and I came thisclose to buying before walking away. (We were waiting for the seller's agent to show up so we could check out a couple of things. She turned out to be as annoyingly pushy as the seller was indisputably insane.) Anyway, I think it was WMBR that played this at like 8:30 on a weeknight—that's what I love about college radio. What happened next is the perfect marriage of old, new and newer: liking something on the radio, checking the station's website for a playlist to see what it was and then buying it on iTunes (I couldn't find it elsewhere). Kudos to UFO for knowing exactly what I like—moderate fidelity, a chunky bass- and drum-driven riff and lyrics about an evil woman who won't get down with you after a long day. Also, their first album is called UFO 1. Confidence!

44. Charizma & Peanut Butter Wolf – My World Premiere
Really crammed this in here. But I love the drum loop—adds some excellent old-school flavor (this was recorded in '91 or '92 but not released until '96, and then again in '03 on the Big Shots album). Also eases some where's-all-the-rap? tension and almost makes up for the fact that EPMD's "Get Off the Bandwagon" was a late scratch. Almost.

45. Muddy Waters – She's Alright
I hope you've made it this far because I'd hate for you to miss this Electric Mud highlight. Late last year I heard it on WZBC while driving into Boston one evening and it seconded the "Evil" progression I related above. Anyway, Muddy Waters was so relevant for so long it's scary. Some might accuse him of leaning toward whatever was popular and then disowning it afterward, but if it produces great music then everyone should be happy, right? Nice little "My Girl" shout-out at the end. [Later: So I just streamed the Black Keys' upcoming album Brothers on the NPR site (I'm not an NPR guy, I just happened to read about the promo) and its "She's Long Gone" is basically a rewrite of "She's Alright." Keeping the Led Zeppelin—and, apparently, Rod Stewart with "Cindy's Lament"—tradition alive! Can I pick 'em or can I pick 'em?]

46. Small Faces – The Autumn Stone
Like I wrote about the Byrds, the Small Faces were not afraid to go in different directions. But where the Byrds were really serious and uptight, the Small Faces had a lot of personality and were not afraid to use humor in their music. This gives their rare quiet, introspective stuff like "The Autumn Stone" and "Become Like You" some real weight. Funny that they and Cream are two of my favorite bands and they both flamed out so quickly. Maybe I have a short attention sp

47. Shellac – The End of Radio
Albini almost gets the last word but not quite! That would have been too predictable. Last word in English though, I suppose. Muddy Waters referenced the Temptations and Shellac does the same with the Modern Lovers' "Roadrunner." Everyone likes to sing about 128 but no one likes driving on it, as I'll be doing in a few hours. Drag.

48. Os Mutantes – Ando Meio Desligado
As I end on a Brazilian note I'd like to state how proud I am that I've included a handful of songs by international artists and not one of them can be considered "world music." Wikipedia (in which I clearly place too much trust) says "Ando Meio Desligado" roughly translates to "I feel a little spaced out." You bet your ass I do, after forty-eight songs and three-plus hours. So I'm ending the way I began, with a side-one-track-one. Final thrill of the ride. Personal electronic devices are not allowed. No cutsies. You must be this high to blow your mind. Don't forget your backpacks. Etc.

---

In closing [Edit: Not quite! Have some more words.]: we've got fourteen songs from the sixties (half that from 1968 alone… shocker!); thirteen from the seventies (six from 1970); only one from the eighties; seven from the nineties; thirteen from the aughts; and nothing from 2010. With the way we're heading—digital awakenings and all—maybe a self-aware iPod can do the heavy lifting for me next year? Be afraid.

More furious madness: Volume 1

A joke on you and me

You know when you keep reading about some album or other, and people are pissing all over themselves to douse the lava-flames of awesomeness that emanate from said album, except they like being engulfed by the overhyped lava so much that they don't panic when they run out of pee? They just drink more water? Except they do it carefully enough so that they don't spill any and cool the lava? Do you know this? Society says you're supposed to welcome the awesome death-flames because everyone else does. Well I'm going to say it: to hell with being burned by lava! To hell with skin grafts! To hell with The Marble Index!

Nothing bothers me more than someone claiming to like something because it's supposedly cool to do so. I am not cool, and I don't care to be. Who do I need to impress? Fitting in with the crowd is for chumps. Same thing goes for those who dislike something because it's popular. Who cares? I had similar rants in my anti-Clash diatribe and 1997 mixtape review. And then last month I picked Led Zeppelin's first album as the best one released in 1969—they are one of the most popular bands around, and a lot of assholes love them, but I'm not going to stop loving them because of that (though I'd be shocked if these assholes like "How Many More Times" as much as I do). Again, who cares?

I was reading Mojo awhile ago and it reviewed a reissue set of The Marble Index and Desertshore. I knew of both but was pretty sure I'd never heard anything off of either one—I own and enjoy her Chelsea Girl, though Mojo (and Nico) seemed to think it's a lightweight affair. Wikipedia tells me that Nico could never listen to it, "becust everyting I vanted for dat record, zey took eet away. I ast for drums, zey said no. I ast for more geetars, zey said no. Und I ast for simpleecity, und zey cover eet un flutes! Ze first time I hert ze album, I cried und eet vas all becust uff ze flute." Fuck all that—it's a good album and I am all over that flute. (As an aside, check out the band Ant Trip Ceremony for excellent sixties flute-playing. That is some sweet action!) I downloaded "I'm Not Sayin'" the other day, the Gordon Lightfoot cover that was her first single, and that's a great song too. I can see how she might have felt molded into something she wasn't on that one, but whatever, I like it. "Eef you luff me." And while she wasn't happy to be pushed around on Chelsea Girl, it's a fairly challenging album—not too many underground (at the time) performers were getting away with longer songs on major-label releases in '67. It's more challenging than her handful of tracks on The Velvet Underground and Nico, anyway.

I know what you're thinking: how can I enjoy a song like "It Was a Pleasure Then" and not find a redeeming quality in anything on The Marble Index? The answer is, I don't really know. I can appreciate that one for the same reason I enjoy some Ya Ho Wha 13 songs, I guess, in that it's far out but there's a definite organic feel to it. Everything on The Marble Index sounds like it was made in a lab by people who don't know what laughter is.

I went ahead and… acquired… the album for the sole purpose of discovering whether or not I liked it. As you've undoubtedly inferred, I think it's a pile of soulless crap. There are few seconds of anything traditionally enjoyable, admirable or artful. Go ahead and tell me I don't get it, because you're right. I un-get it so badly that upon hearing it I immediately feel the need to wash myself with The Mirror Man Sessions for eighty minutes.

Society as a whole doesn't have a blog. But I do, and I even write things sometimes. So let me tell you what's not to like—here's the breakdown, LP-style:

Side A
Prelude
Lawns of Dawns
No One Is There
Ari's Song
Facing the Wind

Side B
Julius Caesar (Memento Hodié)
Frozen Warnings
Evening of Light

A1. Prelude
Coincidence that one of the better songs on the album is one minute long? Absolutely not. It reminds me of Christmas, and I like the sloppy edit at the end. Really lets you know it's a downhill fire-piss ride from here. The biggest mark against it is that it's first on the album and not last, and so there are seven assholes left to listen to. By the way, what did John Cale ever do that was so great? Sure, some innovative and exciting bass, viola and keyboard work with the Velvet Underground (he steals "Sister Ray") and a classic reading of "The Gift." What about the forty-two years since? What's worth seeking out? I'm asking because I don't know. Sure, the Velvets got worse after he left, but he got a lot worse. (I guess the same could be said for Lou Reed, but at least he recorded "The Blue Mask" and has been entertaining us with his Imhotep impression for twenty years.)

A2. Lawns of Dawn
I'll admit this song isn't bad, and progresses interestingly enough (aside from the vocals), but then the whole rest of the album just straight-out copies its example. (As in, I really like Pulp Fiction but I hate everything it influenced.) It is, however, the only song with any actual dynamism, and the novel idea of a beginning and an end. I understand it's this whole minimalist philosophy but to me that only means you're limiting yourself, you're in a hurry or you're dull.

A3. No One Is There
I like when bands record songs and slap on non-sequitur titles, something like Shellac's "Watch Song." That one's about wanting to fight some guy but where's with the aforementioned watch? Shellac has a sense of humor, so probably someone's watch broke while they were recording it. Or maybe someone stole one of their watches one night, and they're appealing to us to keep our eyes open for it the way they did for Bob Weston's coat on "Mantel." So there are the non-sequitur people, and then there are people who name a song after a chorus or repeated phrase from said song. Unwound's "Fingernails on a Chalkboard" is a great example of this, and the funny thing about that is I knew the phrase was going to be repeated throughout the song just from reading the title on the back of Repetition the day it came out, to the point where the only explanation is that I had to have heard it or read about it somewhere beforehand. (I also knew "Go to Dallas and Take a Left" was going to be an instrumental. The shine??) I can't tell you how many times he says "fingernails on a chalkboard" in the middle of that song, but see? Unwound has a sense of humor too—just ask Tom "Hindu Holy Men" Jones. Nico does not. She's German, so maybe it's not her fault. And, as you might have figured by now, no one is there. All uff them are missink.

A4. Ari's Song
I understand the point of this album was probably to break Nico out of her shell as, like, an unknown beautiful woman who may or may not have talent. I remember in either the Velvet Underground biography Up-tight or some in-depth magazine article there was a bit where she was complaining about her performance of "I'll Keep It With Mine" on Chelsea Girls, where she's saying "But I want to sound like Bubbee Deelan!" Later it documented how she ended her romantic relationship with Reed by telling him "I can no longer fuck a Jew." Anyway, she had a kid named Ari. This is his song. Sail away, Ari! You're free now! Unless you're dead, I don't know.

A5. Facing the Wind
This is the worst song I've ever heard. The piano-playing has so much not-soul it reminds me of the time my friends and I were inexplicably watching a video of a Nine Inch Nails performance (?) and one band member accidentally (you know, amid the chaos and nihilism of a Nine Inch Nails performance) knocked over his keyboard, and we could see that a couple of keys were taped down. The electrical tape had more passion than whoever (probably Cale) is striking this poor piano like it's a dead calculator. I think the recording engineer shoots himself at 3:22. Rest in peace, recording engineer.

During this welcome interval, let's discuss the rest of the people and/or things who drive me crazy with their undeserved popularity: the Pretenders (she gets a pass because she's a supposed tough chick with a cool haircut who writes her own songs, even though her songs suck and her band makes them sound even worse); Patti Smith (whose utter nonsense, shitty vocals and ugliness I will never enjoy, and like Chrissie Hynde her band is historically cheesy-sounding—hubby Fred's "City Slang" dances on the unattended grave of everything she's ever done); Heineken (I have nothing in common with people who enjoy this piss and it's evident that, for the most part, I no longer trust green-bottle beers); television ratings (have you ever met someone from a Nielsen family?); English bands who can only sing about English things (the Kinks are the exception that proves the rule); so-called Brooklyn "rock bands" (you can't name me one quality non-rap group from this overrated-in-every-sense-even-though-I've-only-been-there-once-maybe-twice borough other than Sir Lord Baltimore, and even they only had one great album); Brooklyn Brewery beers (see previous item); regular-season winning-streak records (thanks, Peyton, for validating the utter dominance of the Patriots over the last eight years); meteorology (I was happy to be able to leave work at 1:00 yesterday as the company went into panic mode but we got maybe a half inch of snow last night, as opposed to the "six to twelve plus" they'd been predicting for a week); Stephen Merritt and all his sad-sack bands (a long time ago I saw the Future Bible Heroes open for someone at TT the Bear's and he psychologically raped his fellow bandmates for a bad half hour—what a miserable prick). Enough already, all of you. And hey, LaDainian Tomlinson? You missed this list because everyone finally recognizes your plummeting skills and understands that you're a total punk bitch. Here we go with side two.

B1. Julius Caesar (Memento Hodié)
Picking up with the second side, I'm noticing that—strangely enough—these songs would have been better served as a single suite taking up a full side of the LP. They are boring and share a general Teutonic gloom, and this is the only thing that could make them work. "The Celebration of the Lizard" is the most ridiculous thing ever recorded but it hangs together precisely because it's hung together. Excepting "Not to Touch the Earth," which I still really like (don't get me wrong, I enjoy "The Celebration of the Lizard" in its entirety), no individual song has a whole lot to offer. But they somehow pull it off as one piece with the snake and the tribes and whatever he's mumbling about. From that point of view, The Marble Index could possibly work. The other side of the record could then be a bunch of Creedence covers.

B2. Frozen Warnings
I guess I don't mind this song too much. It borders on pretty, even. But it's the same goddamn thing, endlessly. Again. Maybe everyone does that (I don't pay attention to lyrics), but it's so prominent with her manner of singing. "Close to ze frozen borderline." I get it.

B3. Evening of Light
Smack in the middle of this song (a real charmer!) some nice guitar/bass/strings interplay starts bleeding in. It's quite good. But she's busy singing about jumping children and the end of time and so it's all for naught. I do really like the last twenty seconds of this, and it's fitting because it's the last bit of The Marble Index I'll ever listen to. Never again, Nico. Your lava drowns in my pee.