That new Of Montreal album, Skeletal Lamping, is out today in a variety of whimsical formats. Pitchfork doesn't think much of it, giving it a 5.9/10 due in large part, it seems, to the album's unusual structure, in which some songs fragment into two or three distinct passages while others bleed into each other to create continuous suites. For me, that's not such an issue, and while I might not rate Skeletal Lamping as highly as Hissing Fauna when end-of-year list-making time rolls around, I'm still pretty enamored with it right now.

One thing's been bugging me though: there's an isolated vocal melody at 2:09 of "For Our Elegant Caste" (pitchfork: "one of the most annoying choruses of the year") that I swear is from some ELO number on the Xanadu soundtrack (I mean that as a compliment)—only, I can't find that melody anywhere. Am I just hallucinating? Or is it only kind of stylistically similar? (My hunch is that Georgie Fruit has at least watched Xanadu a time or two.)

Bonus: Stranger columnist Michaelangelo Matos gives the album a kinder consideration for Salon, despite the inevitable Flaming Lips comparison (I never made room for this argument in my review of their show, but here goes: Of Montreal > Flaming Lips [at least from the perspective of 2008]).

^{Of Montreal photo by Matt Jordan}

So, I went to this little Of Montreal show last weekend. There was a horse, a hanging, multiple set and costume changes, and something like 26 songs (not least of which was a cover of "Smells Like Teen Spirit"). There was also just so much more than I could possibly fit into the paper. For instance, in addition to this parenthetical:

(Fruit's gender-bending, "queered out" personality could seem like crass tourism or sexual minstrelsy, if it weren't for the fact that Barnes ultimately seems so genuinely sympathetic.)

I also wanted to mention: On the flight to New York, Of Montreal my travel mate was checking the new issue of Blender's review of Skeletal Lamping. On the cover of that issue? Poster girl for sexual identity tourism in 2008, Katy Perry, a (former? lapsed? still?) evangelical pop starlet who cites Paris is Burning as her favorite film and can't shut up about how her heavily made-up persona is just one step away from drag queen. Just seemed like an odd, interesting coincidence.

Also! Of all the songs Of Montreal played that night, the one currently stuck on repeat for me is "So Begins Our Alabee." That sweeping, ascending moment that begins the first chorus just kills! And—this is weird—but the first time I really listened to the song, I completely misheard the line, "the aria is bleeding" as "the areola's bleeding"—in my defense, Barnes' aerial singing voice could easily jump over an "l" sound there, it's totally the kind of anatomical subject matter he fucks with, and the song's nominal subject is a newborn baby, who—and I know nothing about babies—could have been a difficult nurser, right? Right?

Skeletal Lamping is out, in an impressive array of formats, this Tuesday on Polyvinyl. Of Montreal play the Showbox Sodo (new website is wack, guys) on November 19th.

Via Sub Pop:

Late last week our friends in No Age taped a performance on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, to air later this month, on October 27th. Between the band’s rehearsal and when this taping was to take place, No Age’s guitarist Randy Randall was asked to wear something other than the Obama t-shirt he had on (which you can see and admire in the associated photo here – he looks good, right??). The folks working at the show explained that due to the Equal Time Rule, allowing No Age to perform on TV in an Obama t-shirt would force them to allow similar, equal time for that other, elderly fellow who is running in the upcoming Presidential election. So, after a whole lot of wrestling with his conscience and conversation about the situation, Randy decided to go on with the show, and having hand-written the words “Free Health Care” on the inside of his t-shirt, performed wearing it inside-out.

Read the whole story, including some clarification about the Equal Time Rule, a note from Randy Randall and a response from Arthur Magazine's Jay Babcock here.

Also, wouldn't "This is Not an Obama T-Shirt" have been a funnier way to go?

Oliver Stone might not be my favorite director, and his upcoming W. looks like it's going to be a pretty easy, cheap shot biopic just this side of That's My Bush. (Seriously, way to put it out a month before the lame duck leaves office, rather than, oh, say, in 2004—Oliver Stone doesn't care who he pisses off!)

BUT! Stone at least has someone clever on his ad campaign. I don't recall what music featured on the first trailer for the film, but the newer ad, the one that aired last night after the debates on some channel or other, featured the Talking Heads' awesome "Once In a Lifetime," with David Byrne's befuddled, amnesiac lyrics, "And you may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful wife/and you may ask yourself-well...how did I get here?" Maybe it's as obvious a shot as anything else, but buzzed after last night's debate, it seemed perfect.

(Also, this is as good a time as ever—except maybe during Decibel—to mention Carl Craig's epic, spaced-out re-edits of "Once in a Lifetime," "Specimen 1 & 2"—they don't seem to be anywhere on hypemachine or youtube, but they're more than worth seeking out elsewhere.)

Seriously, this:

...pretty much exactly like this:

Nick Hornby confirms on his blog that he has written the lyrics for the next Ben Folds album. Between always loathing Ben Folds and watching in terror as Nick Hornby's novels have gotten worse and worse, I will be doubly sure to give this album a miss.

TED NUGENT REACHES OUT TO SARAH PALIN

Sarah Palin was the first name on TED NUGENT’s list to receive an advance copy of TED, WHITE & BLUE: THE NUGENT MANIFESTO, comprised of 16 chapters on how to fix America. This week, the multi-platinum guitar icon, best-selling author and outspoken activist sent the book—due October 6 via Regnery Publishing—to Palin with a note in praise of the vice presidential nominee’s “bold spirit.”

Dear Governor Palin, Please accept this copy of my new book, "TED WHITE & BLUE-The Nugent Manifesto" for you and your family. As a proud fellow American hunter, fisherman and lover of Alaska's soul cleansing magnificent Spirit of the Wild, we who live our American Dream by God, truth, logic, goodwill and decency, thank you for bringing such defiant common sense and self evident truth back to the GOP and politics. We wish you Godspeed for the best hunting and fishing season of your life and pray to God almighty that you bring your bold spirit to the White House. Godbless, American BloodBrothers, Ted Nugent and family

Did you know that Seattle has a Poet Populist? It's true. And you'll be able to vote for them online starting next week. I have a proposition for someone who's maybe got a little free time, though. I think you should go to this website and nominate The Blue Scholar's Geologic for Poet Populist.

He came in 6th place last year, and that was as a write-in candidate. Now is the time, people. Somebody step up and give us a poet populist we can all get behind. Send part of "Joe Metro" as the sample poem. It's some of the best poetry written in the last few years about Seattle. Plus, it rhymes. Which is very populist.

Idolator reports today on Slipknot and the Game's heated race for the top of this week's Billboard sales charts, a race which has devolved into, yes, a recount:

When I saw the SoundScan charts this morning, I felt kind of bad for Slipknot. The masked metallers haven't been having the best string of luck recently, and now their album All Hope Is Gone was narrowly beaten out for the top spot on the album tally by LAX, the new album from tormented name-dropper the Game. How small of a margin did they lose by, you ask? Try 13 sales. Well, apaprently I wasn't the only one who felt bad about this: Slipknot, upon seeing this statistic, gathered up its brooding rage and did what any red-blooded American would do: They demanded a recount from the SoundScan folks. You can probably guess what happened next.

Yes, the SoundScan people found some 1,244 sales hiding within the bowels of their system, or maybe at a neglected Hot Topic somewhere in the 'burbs, and that was enough to give Slipknot the one-week win over the Game. All Hope Is Gone's final sales total is 239,516 to LAX's un-revised 238,382; whether or not the Game is going to further appeal his own SoundScan total is unknown at this point, but surely he's at least comforted by the fact that his first-week sales beat out those achieved by his former cronies in G-Unit earlier this summer.

Great, now the rockstars are acting like politicians.

Paper Thin Walls is closing up shop today, saying goodbye with a "compendium of ephemera, ruminations, complaints, effluvium and balderdash" that make me wish I had known the site better during its existence. RIP, Paper Thin Walls.

Picking up on yesterday's "alternative" vs "indie" thread (with respects due to Michaelangelo Matos' fine Idolator post on the subject), allow me to direct your attention to the Stranger's Bumbershoot Guide, in which you'll find Monsters of Alt, a chart of the careers of Bumbershoot's '90s heavyweights—Superchunk, Beck, Stone Temple Pilots, and the Offspring. The piece props up the idea of "alt" that Matos (I think convincingly) rails against, that it's specific to the '90s. But hair-splitting aside, it's really just an excuse to make fun of Scott Weiland for being a junkie and Beck for being a Scientologist.

But, if we can get serious again for a moment, Stranger reader Paul Waldrop II writes in with some important corrections:

Errors of note conserning STP in your Article:

No. 4 was released in 1999 not '97.

You failed to mention their 2001 album "Shangri-La Dee Da"

Paul Waldrop
Instictional Designer

Sent from my iPhone

Thank you, Paul. Our sincere apologies to anyone who's ever listened to either of those albums, whenever they came out.

Stranger columnist and music critic at large Michaelangelo Matos has a must-read post up on Idolator today parsing the difference between "alternative" and "indie," a semantic struggle dear to my heart:

The thing is, "indie" isn't working anymore. If anything, it has more specific and limiting baggage than "alternative." Sure, you can ask how music that's supposed to be an alternative to the mainstream keeps that status once it goes mainstream, but calling something on a major label "indie" is some fourth-level-of-hell stage of kidding yourself, in a far more concrete way.

Go read the whole thing right now.

Bonus points: No Age, Alt or Indie?

Pitchfork on Truckasauras' Tea Parties, Guns and Valor: 8.2 [Recommended].

Hopefully the last we will hear of the Olympics for a while:

1. Leona Lewis and Jimmy Page doing "Whole Lotta Love" at the closing ceremonies of the Beijing Olympics, passing the torch to London for the 2012 games with, as Idolator points out, "a song about the size of Robert Plant's dick":

2. "THE RAP OLYMPIC TEAM!"

In this week's Stranger, Michealangelo Matos pits Ryan Adams and Oasis (who share a bill this Tuesday at the WaMu Theater) in a little media mouth-off tête-à-tête (bouche-à-bouche?):

Vices, They’ve Had a Few

ADAMS: Came clean on his Tumblr recently: “I used to take drugs and drink . . . I, like most [A]mericans, would seek some kind of peaceful bliss after a bone crushing day. I only used speedballs (snorted not shot) at the end of my drug use, which was parallel to my last romance. I am in recovery for both things.”

OASIS: Liam, speaking from over-experience, recently called drug-troubled rockers Pete Doherty (Babyshambles) and Tom Chaplin (Keane) “posh lightweights”: “They have one little line, they have one burn and they’re all in rehab.” He was kinder to Amy Winehouse: “[S]he's young so I'd be probably doing the same thing, except for twice the drugs." As for Noel, when he was invited to meet Tony Blair in 1997, he asked the newly elected Prime Minister how he’d managed to stay awake all night watching the election; Blair replied, “Probably not by the same means as you did.”

WINNER: Oasis. Adams went through the wringer, but George W. Bush never cracked cocaine jokes at his expense.

It's good, clean fun.

Today, Stereogum reports that not-quite-recovered Internet addict (and perpetual oversharer) Adams has posted some suggestions on how to enjoy his upcoming shows with the Gallagher brothers (oddly, nothing about not requesting Bryan Adams songs):

1. If you come to see us with OASIS, awesome, remember it’s their game and we’re there too, but their crowd are deep and loyal like us all are to our scene so be nice and also, you know, expect when they play for plenty of singing along- they got mad hits. (also, we prob won’t play wonderwall at an OASIS show- too weird- but i might just be saying that to be contrary (which I love)

2. At our shows, please remember, not everyone who comes knows how this all works. How Cardinals shows are about FANS first and CARDINALS second and if there are some new folks there who want to hear “come pick me up” and get weird, if it upsets you, just be polite and maybe remind them “Ryan is really deaf in one ear and heard of hearing in general so he just can’t hear you,” you know, or whatever.

3. Be kind to your neighbors. They might really have to use the men’s/women’s room- maybe you could be polite and hold their place and stuff- It’s nice when you guy’s have your own seats though. It makes me feel like we are actually like showing you guy’s a movie of a concert we are editing as we play. Also, long shows are tiring and some people are older than others or maybe they have challenges and I think it’s okay for rock to happen where people can sit,

plus we know you know they can’t tell where the weed is coming from if your’re all sitting and trust me, i can smell that stuff up there. smells like a honey cave.

Elsewhere in the post, he uses the word "folks" a lot and describes his new stage setup, which he guarantees will cause you to "poop- srsly ha when you see of the shit we are gonna use."

Ah well, at least the man loves Superchunk (and after effects):

You might have noticed that Line Out has added some new names to our Friends of Line Out blogroll over the weekend. Some introductions:

20 Jazz Funk Greats, Bristol, UK's premiere space disco/nu italo/industrial noise/8-bit hyper rave concern.

Dip Dip Dive, the once and temporary home of Tom Breihan, formerly of Pitchfork and Village Voice blog Status Ain't Hood, currently working on some top-secret serious business.

Last Plane to Jakarta, the online home of Mountain Goats lyricist and master of Master of Reality, John Darnielle.

Mudd Up!, the globally-minded media and musings of DJ/Rupture.

Tiny Lucky Genius aka the Unicorn's Tear, care of Jessica Hopper, currently at work on a book, whose essay "Emo: Where the Girls Aren't" is required reading.

The Loom of Ruin, proprietor Sam McPheeters, formerly of Born Against and Men's Recovery Project, currently of hilarious.

Blissblog, by Simon Reynolds, author of Energy Flash (aka Generation Ecstacy), Rip it Up & Start Again, The Sex Revolts (with Joy Press), and more.

Philip Sherburne, the blog of the eponymous Portlander, DJ, and resident techno advisor to Pitchfork.

Sasha Frere-Jones, an (again eponymous) blog, consisting mostly of photos and timely links from everyone's favorite race-baiting funky white guy, New Yorker pop music critic Sasha Frere-Jones.

Hipster Runoff, a blog whose daily satirization of "hipster" culture makes Adbusters look like tired, old (but glossy) toilet paper.

(We've also had to let a couple friends go, including Nick Sylvester's blog Riff Market and the anonymous Gerard vs Bear, both of which are internet gold but have been dormant since February and April, respectively.)

We missing anyone?

*Note: these people may not actually be all my (or Line Out's) friends.

The Stranger's own Megan Seling, long-time local all-ages booster, podcaster extraordinaire, and regular guest on the End's local music show, the Young and the Restless, will be taking over said show in a matter of weeks. Rationalizing about how this job totally won't make her a soulless corporate shill, Seling says, "I don't have to play Paramore! In fact, I can't play Paramore, since they're not local—it's against the rules."

Congratulations, Megan.

One of the best music mags extant, Wax Poetics, is devoting its 30th issue to rock—a first for the beat-hound/crate-digger bible. A Bad Brains/Elvis P. cover? Nutty. Get the details here. I’m already salivating over the Turkish rock piece.

My beloved subscription copy is going to my old address in California, so I must wait for it to be forwarded by my ex-roommate. You have no idea how painful this is.

I haven’t read the mag much in, um, decades, but this news about Rolling Stone
becoming smaller in size starting with its Oct. 30 issue strikes me as sad—and almost too literally symbolic of the grim state of (music) journalism today.

The New York Times quotes RS founder Jann Wenner, usually nostalgia’s staunchest champion, as saying: “All you’re getting from that large size is nostalgia.” (Insert sexual innuendo here.)

No.

Pitchfork has M.I.A.'s response to the ridiculous (and tired) "Is M.I.A. a terrorist?" meme (which gets even more ridiculous in these comments):

"I don't support terrorism and never have," she wrote in a statement. "As a Sri Lankan that fled war and bombings, my music is the voice of the civilian refugee. Frankly, I am not trying to start dialogue with someone who is really just seeking self-promotion."

Because exploiting geopolitical strife for self-promotion is anathema to M.I.A. (JK! Because at least M.I.A. self-promotes worthwhile art.)

On the heels of the Pineapple Express-fueled chart ascent of "Paper Planes", E-Online answers this possibly pot-addled letter from a reader:

I really like that M.I.A. single "Paper Planes." But I hear she supports terror. Is that true? Is she a terrorist?

Welcome to the Hot 100, M.I.A.

From Portland's KATU news:

PORTLAND, Ore. - A mother who sent her 8-year-old daughter to a Portland rock music-themed camp for girls says she is shocked by what she thinks is age-inappropriate material distributed to the young attendees.

The mother, who did not want to be identified, said her daughter returned home with music that contained graphic violent imagery and lyrics that were both sexually charged and racist.

Also among the items was a tape by the band Bikini Kill that the concerned mom said had sexual content so explicit she was too embarrassed to repeat it. She said the music also had racially offensive content.

She said that if her daughter had heard the music and asked her what some of the words meant, it would have been "very difficult to explain to her."

Remember her? She gave us "U.N.I.T.Y." and "Rough."

Days go by. The economic climate changes. And now the Queen of hiphop is repping the arctic.
Yes, Latifah is the narrator of Arctic Tale. So sad, so sad.

Re: the new No Age video, the internet has spoken:

(ht yardlie)

Gigwise reports today that Peter Gabriel plans to cover Vampire Weekend's "Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa" (aka, the song that name-drops Gabriel in its lyrics). What's next, a Lil Jon version of "Oxford Comma"? (Please, please, please let that be next).

And bizarrely impassioned Vampire Weekend hate in 3...2...1...

I know (you know), not another Entertainment Weekly list, right? But this Michel Gondry cutated list of 25 classic music videos is actually worth checking out (Stereogum collects them all on one handy page here) if for no other reason than it includes this fantastic clip for New Order's even more fantastic "Perfect Kiss," which flips the conventions of the studio/performance video to create something more like uncomfortable verité (also: frog noises!), and which I'd somehow never seen before today:

Really, nothing good can come from looking at (or re-posting) a list of Entertainment Weekly's 100 Best Records from 1983-2008. Obviously it's going to be almost completely wrong. And it is. It is so wrong. But that's just the thing - it is soooo wrong. Bafflingly wrong, to the point where it actually becomes worth looking at, if only to wonder what the fuck was going on with the people who compiled it.

Continue reading "There are only 28 albums that are better than Kelly Clarkson's Breakaway" »

Soulja Boy responds to Ice T's hip hop Andy Rooney-isms:

Under the Radar is making a big fuss about their new "Protest Issue." I guess a bunch of artists were tapped to be photographed with signs about their own personal protest ideas or something. Here's the problem:

Under the Radar unleashes 2008’s "Protest Issue", using the time-honored connection between politics and music to promote political dialogue and awareness. The Protest Issue features two alternating collectable covers: one with R.E.M.’s Michael Stipe and Modest Mouse’s Isaac Brock, the other with Death Cab for Cutie’s Chris Walla, The Decembrists’ Colin Meloy, and Spoon’s Britt Daniel.

Don't see it yet? How about now?

Notice any similarities between their cover models? Like, maybe how they are all white men?

I guess no one protested the lack of diversity in print media for the issue, so I'm taking up the cause. If you are going to go through the trouble of having two collectible covers, couldn't you at least put Chuck D or Beth Ditto on there or someone? There's plenty of room! A little tokenism would even be better than nothing.

Last week, I Slogged about a mystery book that's coming out from Simon and Schuster. There are 300,000 copies coming out, and nobody was told what the book was actually about.

Today, GalleyCat reports that Madonna's brother is writing a memoir about...being Madonna's brother. I'm going to say right now that if they didn't have sex, there's no point to this goddamned book.

The only thing more impressive than Isaac Hayes’ gold-plated El Dorado Cadillac inside The Stax Museum of American Soul Music is an entire authentic, 100-year old Mississippi Delta church. Relocated to the site when it was built around 2001, the church’s front doorway serves as the museum entrance after you leave an introductory film about the label's history. You literally have to walk down the aisle between the aged, wooden pews and “pay your respects” to the roots of Memphis soul as admission to the rest of the exhibits.

I visited the movie theater turned recording studio turned museum/music academy on McLemore Avenue in south Memphis when I traveled down to the capital of the mid-south a few years back. It’s both a dazzling distraction amidst the rough neighborhood that it’s still hoping to revitalize and a first-rate tourist mecca for pilgrims of the Memphis sound. Once unaware, the museum definitely opened the eyes (and ears) of this ignoramus to realize there was more to Booker T. & the M.G.’s than “Green Onions”.

Starting this Sunday and running thru Thursday, the Northwest Film Forum is screening Respect Yourself: The Stax Record Story and Wattstax - the former, a documentary chock-full of archival material put together to mark the 50th Anniversary of the label and the latter, a documentary of the 1972 Stax label memorial concert for the Watts riots, re-released for 35th Anniversary screenings.

It's a day old, but Stranger columnist Michaelangelo Matos' most recent installment of "Project X" on Idolator is worth a belated look. In the post, Matos gathers his family, following a Mother's Day feast at Red Lobster, to evaluate the Billboard Hot 100 Top 10—it's like the Wire's jukebox jury, only you might know what the hell they're talking about, or Arthur's "Bull Tongue" column, only with no Thurston Moore. In any case, the Matos family's banter makes me think that, if they were so inclined, they could just start their own music criticism concern (The Matos Weekly? Matosfork?) and they'd probably do pretty well (maybe Miguel could handle ad sales, I don't know). A sample:

3. Lil Wayne ft. Static Major, "Lollipop" (Cash Money)
Alex: Oh god.
Lorie: [The Supremes'] "Reflections"—that's what [the beginning] reminds me of.
Alex: "Apple bottom jeans, boots with the fur": I know this song. I don't like this, though. Oh! It's the wrong song. I'm thinking of "Low" [by Flo Rida ft. T-Pain].
Brittany: Is this Lil Wayne?! "Cash Money Records reppin' for the nine-nine and the 2000!" I like Mannie Fresh better. He was a lot funnier to listen to. What's that song, "Get Your Roll On"? Lil Wayne was like 12 years old when Cash Money Records came out—that's what I always think about when I hear him. He was like 12 years old with a kid, and his lonely teardrop.
Lorie: A kid? Wow! I've been outdone!
Brittany: Yeah—nobody thought it was biologically possible, but it's been done, Mom.
Lorie: You know what this reminds me of? Rap.
Alex, Brittany, Michael: It is rap.
Brittany: It's more like a distant relative of rap. What kind of rap did you listen to, Mom, the Sugarhill Gang?
Lorie: No, I listened to that Superman song.
Michael: You mean "Rapper's Delight"?
Lorie: Yes!
Brittany: That's the Sugarhill Gang.
Lorie: Oh.
Michael: Wait—do you mean the song about Superman and Lois Lane, or the one about Supermanning that ho?
Lorie: [confused look]
Michael: OK, never mind.

It's getting so that I'm already sick of bands before I actually hear the bands. If I hear about Santogold being the next M.I.A. one more time, I will vomit. Music blogs have to figure out some way to stagger their coverage. I was cleaning out my RSS Reader today and I think I read the name Santogold some nine hundred and seventy-three times. Enough with the Santogold please, Internet. Thanks in advance.

P.S. Santogold!

No Ghostface cameo = No cred.

So I got an e-mail from a friend yesterday, sent to me and other friends, suggesting that we haven't seen each other in a long time and so we should all go see Shine a Light, the Scorsese-directed Rolling Stones documentary this weekend.

I immediately said no. Actually I think I said:

Fuck, no! Iron Man! Iron Man!

It occurs to me that, in that split second before hitting the 'reply' button and writing my response, I did all kinds of calculus in my head: I pitted my love of Martin Scorsese's films against my hatred of what the Rolling Stones have become. My Stones hatred overwhelmed my love of Scorsese. And I also pushed my hatred of what the Rolling Stones have become against my love of friends who I haven't seen in a month or so. My hatred of the Rolling Stones, again, completely defeated my love of friends. And, by pitting my hatred of what the Rolling Stones have become in direct competition with Iron Man, I have categorically proven that I love Iron man more than the Stones.

In fact, I can't think of any scenario that would get me into that theater. If, somehow, an imaginary threat like "See the Rolling Stones movie or these six random children would die of cancer" were made real, I would of course see the documentary, because while I may be a jackass at times, I am not a monster. But I would hate every minute of the movie.

So it occurred to me today that I should write a note to my friend thanking him for finally giving me a definitive method for expressing my hatred of what the Rolling Stones have become: I don't hate them quite enough to kill, but no reasonable incentive would ever get me to see one of their performances.

15-year-old Miley Cyrus is writing her memoirs, for somewhere between one and nine million dollars. Who wants to review it for me?

Today Idolator linked to James Montgomery's article about what it's like to be a music journalist in the day and age when mainstream music writing is more about chasing down stories about rumored sex tapes and "monitoring baby bumps":

For a solid hour on Tuesday afternoon, I basically should've gotten fired from my job. This is not because I was drinking in the office again or harassing my (sorta) co-worker Heidi Montag or even stealing boxes from the supply closet to complete my awesome fort (that was Monday).

No, it was because I was furiously Googling photos of Miley Cyrus in her bra.

OK, now before Human Resources contacts me (or my wife leaves me), please know that I was doing said Googling for a story I was working on — a follow-up to a 300-word blurb we ran on Monday that was read by 71,000 people (!) in less than 24 hours. (By comparison, last week's Bigger Than the Sound is currently sitting at just more than 2,400 clicks.) Please know that I am not some sort of crazy pervert and that — to borrow perhaps the most overused excuse of all time — I was just doing my job (honest).

I'm not exactly sure what the rest of you were doing, though. Because for most of Tuesday, "Miley Cyrus Bra" was the most-searched term on Google, ahead of "Pennsylvania Exit Polls," "Kijana Carter" and "Earth Day." Phrases like "Racy Miley Cyrus Photos" and "Miley Cyrus Underwear Pictures" also logged time in Google Trends' Top 100, as did pretty much any possible combination of the words "leaked," "pics" and "Net" you could think of (also, nice to see "Vanessa Hudgens Pics" making a comeback).

Basically, for an entire day, people were more interested in seeking out semi-nude — and possibly fake? — photos of a 15-year-old pop star than they were in reading about the death of soul singer Al Wilson (which is sad), potential Jeep Liberty recalls (which is terrifying) and "Alligator in Kitchen" (which is puzzling). And while all of that should probably make me want to curl up and die — or at least weep for the state of humanity — it doesn't. Because this has basically become my entire life.

Read the funny, thoughtful, sad but true article here.

While our May-June issue will be our last in bimonthly-magazine form, we're very happy to announce that we will be teaming up with University of Texas Press to present a semiannual "bookazine." Envisioned as a sort of hybrid between a book and a magazine, this new No Depression creation will make its debut in the fall. Look for 1 (or "76", as we'll dub it, in deference to the magazine's precedence) in the music-books section of your local bookstore -- and also watch this space for upcoming details about ordering subscriptions. (If you're a current subscriber to the magazine, we'll soon be sending you a note in the mail regarding the transition.

Some of the details will become clearer as we get further into the process of creating the first edition. Generally speaking, what we envision is that the bookazine will continue to provide a home for our long-form pieces which have less chance of transitioning to the website, where the editorial focus will be on more timely elements such as live reviews, record reviews, and news reports.

Read the full letter after the jump.

Continue reading "No Depression Update" »

Via Idolator:

1 Sex Sex 0.132%
2 Lil Wayne Music (Artist) 0.109%
3 Low Music (Artist) 0.100%
4 Chris Brown Music (Artist) 0.091%
5 No Air Music (Song Title) 0.081%
6 Porn Sex 0.078%
7 Family Guy TV 0.077%
8 Soulja Boy Music (Artist) 0.065%
9 Naruto Anime 0.065%
10 Funny Comedy 0.063%
11 Jonas Brothers Music (Artist) 0.063%
12 Usher Music (Artist) 0.053%
13 Hannah Montana Music (Artist) 0.050%
14 Jeff Dunham Comedy 0.050%
15 Miley Cyrus Music (Artist) 0.048%
16 Jabbawockeez TV (Dance Group) 0.047%
17 Touch My Body Music (Song Title) 0.047%
18 Love Song Music (Song Title) 0.045%
19 Fights Sports 0.044%
20 American Idol TV 0.043%
21 Bleeding Love Music (Song Title) 0.042%
22 Mariah Carey Music (Artist) 0.042%
23 With You Music (Song Title) 0.041%
24 Sexy Can I Music (Song Title) 0.039%
25 WWE Sports 0.038%

Huh. Who knew Duluth's slowcore darlings Low were almost as popular as Lil Wayne?

Via Idolator via Brandon Soderbergh: I think I need to start watching egotrip's new reality rap show, Miss Rap Supreme. Pretty much anything egotrip touches, even a VH1 reality show, is guaranteed to be good. So, who's got that TiVo?