to ease your painful lives

From Wikipedia's article on Robert Pollard:

"Pollard has stated that during a Lollapalooza, he and the other guys in GBV beat The Beastie Boys and Billy Corgan in a basketball game. He also stated that Kim Deal and Kelley Deal were cheering for them during the game and that Steve Drozd was riding on a bicycle during the game."

I think my favorite thing about Wikipedia is those editors who seem to know exactly what information is essential to the readers of each article. Points also to Pollard for knowing what names to drop for maximum geek reaction. I only wonder how Billy Corgan ended up on a team with The Beastie Boys, the other associations seem so impeccably natural that they might as well have been assumed.

In a moment of channel flipping desperation, I recently landed on VH1's Greatest Songs of the 90s, for all of about 10 minutes. Even that brief exposure was enough to confirm that the editorial staff of that renowned station is still unashamed as ever to stand up for what's bad, but it also delivered a punishing blow in the sight of the ordinarily unimpeachable Jonathon Coulton among the myriad ranks of their accomplices. Only Pollard's pharmacist proved capable of delivering relief, in the form of an extended Guided By Voices rock-out session.

On the subject of medicine, I'm not proud to admit that my now considerable fondness for Iron & Wine's song Passing Afternoon didn't begin until some time after the doctor's fateful bus crash.

viva hate

As far as I can tell, Katy Perry's song I Kissed a Girl is intended only for children and those few unfortunate adults with the pathetic musical incuriousity to think its subject matter is something new in the world. Without whatever shock value the track provides if you've had a tame and sheltered existence, there's little to be interested in. The song's profound lack of emotional authenticity could be forgiven if it sounded good, just as the brazen attitude it presents would be justified if the song were at all sexy; unfortunately it doesn't and it isn't. Like Amy Winehouse before her, Katy Perry is an artist who has successfully used supposed controversy and cavalier sexuality to get a free pass from mainstream critics on the issue of her marginal talent.

I haven't had a chance to hear the entire album yet, and at least the title track does recapture the sense of musical urgency that made A Rush of Blood to the Head so satisfying (and was noticeably lacking from much of the middling X&Y); but am I the only one who began to worry after the third or fourth listen to Viva La Vida that Chris Martin's best lyrics have all been written? It's not that what he does on the new song is bad, it's the impression that he's trying so hard to be good and that this is the best he's come up with.

just the same

Attention producers of TV's "Weeds": Your program's theme song is irritating as hell. This cannot possibly be news. It could be performed by the London Philharmonic, it would still be irritating.

talking without speaking

Blender Magazine lists Paul McCartney, Bernie Taupin and Ben Gibbard among the worst lyricists of all time. Their list of the worst bands includes the Goo Goo Dolls and Live. The Sounds of Silence by Simon & Garfunkel sits alongside tracks by The Beatles and REM on their list of rock's worst songs. But at least they aren't afraid to stick up for Justin Timberlake, making a point of excluding him from N'Sync's entry on their list of "wusses". Journalistic excellence on par with that of their frequent partner VH1, a cable channel best known for hard-hitting documentary television chronicling the romantic lives of the formerly famous.