Bio of eMusic CEO Danny Stein

This is just FYI.  (Note to everyone: the next expansive download service for smaller labels needs to be run by a manager with a background in promoting independent music rather than the president of an investment firm.)

From his corporate bio:

A serial entrepreneur, Daniel Stein is president of JDS Capital Management, Inc., an investment firm based in New York that invests in private, public and distressed debt and equity. He is CEO of Dimensional Associates, the operating company that manages the private equity investments made by JDS. Dimensional owns a variety of digital media assets, including eMusic, The Orchard and Qwikker Technology, LLC. Stein is also currently Chairman and CEO of eMusic, a role he resumed in 2008 after having held it from 2003 to 2005 when Dimensional Associates acquired eMusic from Vivendi Universal’s VUNet USA.

In 2002, Stein was CEO of TTR Technologies, a copy protection technology company, whose assets were sold to Macrovision (NASDAQ:MVSN). Stein was president of Javu Technologies from 2000-2001. Javu licenses software and services to corporations that store, manage, deliver or repurpose video assets. Prior to joining Javu, Stein was president, chief operating officer and director of the Wedding List Company from 1999-2000, an Internet company with retail outlets specializing in the wedding gift and registry business. The Wedding List was sold to Martha Stewart/Omnimedia in 2001.

In 1994, Stein founded Burly Bear Network, a company providing cable programming and online services to college students. From inception to 1999, Burly Bear became the largest college cable television network and online service, servicing eight million households throughout the country. Burly Bear was sold in 1997 to Lorne Michaels, owner of Broadway Video and creator and producer of Saturday Night Live. From 1992-1993 Stein worked in the executive-training program at retailer Lechters Housewares. Stein graduated from Cornell University in 1992.

eMusic Sells Out in July

eMusic, the premeire download site for small-label music, has decided to self-destruct next month.

I first became aware of the site’s policy change in a banner announcement on my eMusic homepage yesterday.  First of all, to me, a loyal customer for years, the change means that my $240/ year now only gets about half the downloads/month that it used to (my tracks go from 90 to 50).  And that’s pretty annoying, given that they’ve promised in writing that they wouldn’t change terms for older customers who have been with the company since its beginnings.

What’s a lot worse is the reason that this price-change is taking place:  an expansion of the eMusic catalog to include music from labels like SONY.  Had this price adjustment been made to expand the indie-label catalog, I really wouldn’t be complaining.  This is a business after all, and the numbers have to work out.  But it is truly insulting to have the CEO write an open letter that pretends this move a win-win for everyone when, in actuality, they are doubly screwing-over their long-time customers who already own Springsteen albums in other formats (and who therefore don’t care about this expansion).

Why would this site, which for years has relied on loyal long-time customers such as myself, make a move like this?  I seriously have no idea.  This has got to be one of the dumbest business decisions I’ve ever witnessed.  There is an all-out revolt going on at the blog site with the open letter (you really should check it out).  Please add your comments to the open letter blog if this means anything to you … I’m sure the agreements with these labels have already been completed, but our words are still the best chance we have at a reversal.

If things move forward, I’ll leave eMusic and take my money with me.  For the same price, I’ll be able to buy two more shiny new vinyl albums directly from the labels every month, and many will come with free digital downloads.

Harvey Milk, Mt. St. Mtn.

After an irresponsibly long hiatus, its time to get back on track with a quick review of last night’s Bottle Tree show.  We arrived late due to an impromptu Assault on Precinct 13 viewing party, so I didn’t catch the first band of the evening.

Second up, Mt. St. Mtn. from Birmingham, AL.  It’s kind of hard to describe the sound, except that its highly techical rock– borderline metal(?).  All members are clearly very talented musicians, but I’m not sure I “got it” as much as I would’ve liked.  I had trouble finding a focus.  That being said, I really enjoyed the experience of watching them play and I’m looking forward to checking them out again.  Maybe I just wasn’t ready for the onslaught of complexity.  Whatever, they’re great.  Check them out as soon as you can.

Harvey Milk was the much-anticipated headliner for the night.  For anyone who hasn’t heard this band, they’re basically the heaviest thing you can imagine.  They’re best known for sludgey, low-end rumbling sounds … droney guitar and bass, wailing vocals, sparse percussion.  And that’s how they started off the night.  Kyle thinks they were playing their already slow music at about 70% speed of the recordings and I don’t think that’s far-off.  Unfortunately, some folks at the show didn’t have the patience for this sort of artsy doom and cut out early. Well, those people really missed out because Harvey Milk played like a freight train leaving a loading depot–they started off at slow and methodical, but accellerated into what would eventually become a Zepplin/ZZ Top-inspired rock show that was loud, fast-paced and unstoppable.  They were literally stretching during the early part of the evening (see pic) … playing their more deliberate numbers early before letting it loose.  So, so good.  And I’ll be honest, it took me many listens of this band to really get into the sound; it was kind of a challenge.  But since it clicked, I’ve really gotten into it.  And their live show is NOT to be missed.  Lucky for you, they’re coming back through Birmingham in July with Torch.  Don’t miss it!

Noteworthy Listens

I need to to this more often, psoas not to accidentally leave anything out.

First off, best downloading service I’ve run into yet:  eMusic.  I don’t know what their pricing scheme is these days, but I got grandfathered in on a great deal early on.  Basically the way it works is you get a certain number of “downloads” (e.g. songs) each month.  They don’t carry over so you have to keep up.  The selection is not going to be as broad as iTunes, especially with the major label stuff.  But in terms of selection of smaller label music from the past 20 years of so, Emusic can’t be beaten.  Plus, it’s all DRM-free mp3 format, so you don’t have to bother with all of Apple’s AAC copyright racket.  I recommend it.

Okay, lets get to it.  Hover over the “sample track” note and you should find a hyperlink to listen to the music (wordpress wants to charge me to upload mp3s … ugh, i refuse to pay for that).  I’m going to keep the descriptions short, since listening is worth way more than my enthusiastic descriptions.  Here’s the best of what I’ve heard lately, in no particular order.

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Earth – The Bees Made Honey in the Lion’s Skull (Southern Lord, 2008 )

sample track: Rise to Glory

Repetitive, slow and sexy.  Earth played Bottletree last year and I somehow missed the show … can’t wait for their return.  Check out this great performance here on APT’s We have Signal.  Incredible.

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Sleep – Jerusalem (Music Cartel, 1999)

sample track:  Jerusalem Pt 4

Sleep made sludgy doom metal through the 90′s.  This is not the kind of music that I ever expected to enjoy, but I really have come to love this album.  “Jerusalem” is actually a slightly modified version of an earlier album “Dopesmoker”, which was rejected by the bands new big-shot label, London Records, in the mid-90′s.  Apparently Sleep took almost all of the six figures that the label fronted them, and spent it on two things:  pot and studio time (mostly the former).  What they produced was a mystical tribute to weed consumption, consisting largely of variants of the same riff for an hour.  The label was not pleased.  Eventually a smaller label released the album, this time called “Jerusalem” and broken in to 6 pieces.  Oh man, this stuff is soo soo good.  It took me a while to get into it, but once I got it, it became so enjoyable.  Slow, distorted guitars and drums.  Highly hipnotic.  Check it out–it might surprise you.  I picked up “Dopesmoker” on vinyl the other day … it was finally released in 2003.  Strangely enough, I prefer the second incarnation to the original.

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Swervedriver – Mezcal Head (A&M, 1993)

sample track:  For Seeking Heat

These guys are considered shoegaze pioneers, although I don’t really hear it in this album.  This is just great rock music.

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Dead Meadow – Feathers (Matador, 2005)

sample track:  At Her Open Door

Layered.  Pychodelic.  Melodic.  Heavy.  On recommendation from my good friend Pat over at the prison ship.  Totally delivers beginning to end.

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The New Year – The New Year (Touch and Go, 2008 )

Sample Track:  Folios

I thought about passing this album on to my grandparents because they love music and although this is “rock” music, it’s gotta be some of the most palatable, well-crafted guitar music I’ve heard in a while.  The Kadane brothers et al have done it again (their two previous albums in this outfit are also outstanding).  If you like this stuff, make sure to check out their previous band, Bedhead.  This was my favorite album of last year.

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Lil Wayne & DJ Drama – Dedication 2 Gangta Grillz

Sample Track:  This is What I Call Her

Wayne claims to be the best rapper alive … he’s definitely way up there.  Can’t say I’m too excited about his new rock album, which is supposed to drop in the next few months … the first release, “prom queen,” is undeniably bad.  But, whatever, I still support the dude.  This mix tape came out in 2006 and really showcases his skill since it lacks the requisite club-hoppers found on his major releases (see Carter III).

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Shellac – At Action Park (Touch and Go, 1994)

Sample Track:  My Black Ass

Simply the best punk-rock band out there.  This was the band’s first album, but they’ve made plenty more great music over the past 15 years.  The latest, Excellent Italian Greyhound, is effin’ brilliant and a little less abrasive than this early stuff.

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That’s all I got for now.  Any music recommendations?  Love to hear ‘em…

ABNormal Distribution

Last week’s Economist mag contained a killer special section on the inner-workings, failures, and future of modern finance.  This article on mathematical modeling of risk was particularly rad.  The highlight for me was this graph, which demonstrates a simple and common way that risk is modeled in regards to various investment vehicles …

The author points out that the normal distribution (dark blue line) has and should continue to be used to model  simple classes of risk, like those associated with a sector of an equities market, a type of bond, etc.  However, more complex types of investment structures (for instance, the nightmarish mortgage-backed securities) cannot be modeled with a normal distribution, and this has now been proven by mathematician Benoit Mandelbrot.

“…if the Dow Jones Industrial Average followed a normal distribution, it should have moved by more than 3.4% on 58 days between 1916 and 2003; in fact it did so 1,001 times. It should have moved by more than 4.5% on six days; it did so on 366. It should have moved by more than 7% only once in every 300,000 years; in the 20th century it did so 48 times.”

Looks like the normal distribution completely failed to reflect reality.  My favorite part is the mention that a former CFO from a major investment bank is on the record in 2007 as saying that they had seen 25 standard deviation movements in some markets for several days in a row!  So much for the “no one could have seen this coming” excuse.  They knew exactly what that meant.  Statistically, a shift that large should be a once in a millennium type of movement.  If each of those days is considered an independent event, then either the probabilistic laws of the universe were imploding or the model was complete garbage.

Mandelbrot basically found that the tails of the distribution need to be raised way above the normal (broken light blue line), suggesting a much higher-than-previously-thought probability of massive gains (see: 2006-7) or catastrophic loss (2008).

If the risk had been properly modeled, then maybe this crisis wouldn’t be quite so severe.  Unfortunately, there was money to be made …

Cyprien Gaillard

I was trying to find Gaillard’s video work “Desniansky Raion” (2007) on the youtuber … this piece was about the best I could do.  I kind of like the music, but my horror/fascination at this footage of organized fighting in St. Petersburg is the real draw.  Anyone know anything else about this?  Sounds terrifying.

Wrecked.

More posts soon, I swear.

Fancy

Oh, right.  Now you want to get involved in science.

Polvo

I’m not the biggest Polvo fan out there, but I definitely jumped at the opportunity to see a band this important reunite at Bottletree last night.

Let me first say this.  Have you ever seen someone get their ears rocked off?  Like, his lobes on the ground, geysers of blood pulsing out of the side of his face, yet still banging his head along to the beat?  Yeah, well that happened (it didn’t actually happen).  That’s how much (and how loudly) Polvo rocks.

The music was noisy and energetic, and somehow came off as incredibly polished in its sloppy style.  And I say that not to be critical in any way … this standard rock quartet is loaded with talent that seems to have only grown over the years.  The messiness of their sound is completely intentional, a defining characteristic.  Though I haven’t seen them live, Sonic Youth is all I could think when listening to this band last night.  But maybe more math rock.  And more noise.  Droning bass throughout, effects pedals littering the floor in front of both guitars.  Ash Bowie kept whipping out these magnificent, rare 6-string axes.

I think they only had something like 6 songs on their setlists, but fear not.  That was only because they gave each one at least 10 minutes, with much of that time being extended in raucous but highly organized rock.  A number of songs were new, and you could see the excitement all over the thirty-somethings’ faces as they consumed fresh meat from their high school heroes.

Rockstar

I think this guy might actually be for real.  Having come to political maturity at the beginning of 8 years of incompetence, laziness, and plain dumbassishness, I don’t even know where to begin with Barry.  His speech last night proved once again that he is one of the most powerful speakers this country has seen in a very long time.  He’s intelligent, witty, athletic, sexy (am I right ladies?!), moderate, pensive, composed … he’s just polished and smooth all around.

How could I not vote for this guy?  Because when it really comes down to it, Obama was born to be President of the United States.  Destiny.  It’s almost like the last 8 years were just a setup by the Illuminati to prove just how good this guy is (“Alright, the prophesy says he’s a brilliant leader … we’ll see about that.  Let’s see … how about some terrorism, never-ending war, domestic spying, global warming, a decrease in a purchasing power of the dollar … hmmm.   Not bad, not bad, but let’s up the ante and throw in the worst financial crisis in 75 years AND have America’s image be dragged through the mud internationally.  Oh yeah, and let’s have it all timed just a few year before the social security bomb goes off.  Let’s see what you got, golden child!”

Who knows … maybe he’s not the hero that he appears.  Maybe he has some sort of Clintonian fatal flaw.  Maybe.  But I really don’t think so.  I think he’s genuinely a good person, and one who’s going to do a whole lot to repair the damage that has been done to this country over the past few years.  I think he’s honest.  And I think when he makes mistakes, we should certainly NOT take it easy on him.  He’s the kind of person who can listen to criticism and better himself through it.

For the first time since I became politically aware, I have hope.  Maybe things will work out after all.

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update: 12-7-08

there was a great long-form interview with Obama on Meet the Press this morning.  Check it out here.

Top Notch

Watch these guys in their mid-40s shame and destroy EVERYTHING ELSE trying to be punk rock.  I will gladly fly anywhere in the continental US to see this band at the next opportunity.  Who’s in?

Shellac is (L to R):  Steve Albini, Todd Trainer, and Bob Weston.  Oh, and they are the best.

(thanks k’aisle)

Magnolia Electric Co., Live at Bottle Tree

A friend of mine told me that Jason Molina played to a small room full of students at Sewanee in the early 2000′s.  It was just Molina and his acoustic guitar, and after a few hours of his mournful ghost songs, there were few dry eyes in the whole place.  A former girlfriend of mine refuses to listen to Molina’s previous band, Songs:Ohia.  The tragedy of it is that she absolutely adores his music–she claims she can’t handle the melancholy that it brings her.  It’s not just that it’s sad, it’s that the emotion coming out of Molina is too tangible … it strikes unnervingly close to the actual experience of loss, conveyed through sound alone.

That is Jason Molina live on his own or with Songs:Ohia.  The current incarnation of Molina is called Magnolia Electric Co., and although this project inevitably retains some of the darkness that I was referring to, it also brings something lighter (hope?).  The show this past Saturday at the picture-perfect Bottle Tree of Birmingham, Alabama was as worthwile a concert experience as I’ve ever had.  The band is a 5-piece with your standard instrumentation:  Molina leads the way with vocals and a unique-looking acoustic guitar, Jason Groth is brilliant on his twangy, beat-up telecaster (not sure I’ve ever lusted after a guitar quite as much as this one) and back-up vocals, Mark Rice brings energy and subtle sophistication on his drum set, and the band is rounded out by always-solid performances from Mackie Hotpepper on bass and Michael Kapinus on keys and vocals.

I’m not going to add much more, but let me say this quickly:  Magnolia Electric’s version of rich midwestern country-influenced rock, puts anything coming out of Nashville to shame (and ironically, I drove hastily back from that very city to see this band Saturday night).  These guys are tight and professional and playing for the love of the music and nothing more.  Molina’s haunting tenor filled up the venue during perfectly restrained verses, punctuated by climaxes of electricity led by Groth.  The whole experience was unbelievably satisfying; this was one of those shows (not unlike Smog), that remains with me days later and helps me move into the new week with an unusual calm.

A couple of other things.  (1)  3/5 band members were wearing ascots, which is completely awesome.  (2) Opening acts The Broken Letters and David Vandervelde were also fantastic.  (3) Finally, a couple of links for those needing more Magnolia:

Magnolia Electric Co Website

Pitchfork Interview with Jason Molina

Check out the photos and don’t miss this band ever again.

~Chaz

This Mess We’re In

Wow.  These are definitely some interesting days in global economics.  Just this morning, a coordinated 0.5% rate-cut was announced by the Fed, European Central Bank, the Bank of England, and a few smaller central banks.  Yesterday, the Fed announced that it would start buying up commercial paper in an attempt to reinvent this market for short-term corporate debt.  Governments across Europe are announcing plans to guarantee deposits with the hopes of preventing bank runs.  Global equity markets are taking a major beating; the Dow Jones has lost an impressive 15% of its value in the past month, resetting approximately to 2004 levels.  Oh yeah, and last week the American congress passed a 700 billion dollar bail-out plan, which may or may not work.

Banks are simply not loaning money to each other at reasonable prices … the commonly cited LIBOR rate, a measure of the price of money between banks, has spiked in an unprecedented way.  Take a look at this chart for overnight LIBOR.

Notice that the rate that banks charge each other to borrow money moves fairly smoothly for the majority of the last 5 years.  Then compare that graph with this one, which shows the effective Federal Funds rate, the target interest rate set by the Fed for banks to borrow from each other, for the same 5 year term.

Notice a pattern?  Yep, they look essentially the same for much of the 5 year term.

And this is certainly not unintentional.  The Federal Funds rate serves as the foundation for all interest rates in the American economy.  Even interest rates for credit cards and car loans are based on this rate … only they are way down (or up, depending on how you look at it) the chain of interest rates because there are further removed from government’s target interest rate.  But banks are not far removed at all.  They are the ones who are being directly targeted by the Federal Funds rate, so it makes sense that LIBOR essentially mirrors the Federal Funds rate.  Recently, as the charts clearly demonstrate, this has not been the case.  LIBOR has moved erratically upward, while the target rate set by the Fed has actually dropped.  So we’ve got a disconnect.  What happened?  Well, thanks to some creative finance guys, banks are holding a bunch of toxic assets that have the potential to make them insolvent.  The greatest part is: since these deals were private agreements between institutions, there was (and is still) no public exchange that allows everyone to know what everyone else holds.  In other words, banks don’t know if they can trust each other … maybe the 1 month loan Bank A makes today will not be repaid because the toxic assets of Bank B will have dragged Bank B under.  Without trust between these institutions, the central bank can do little to affect the money supply with its target Federal Funds rate.

A hint of good news in the face of all of this gloom: this is the BEST time to learn about and understand our economic system thanks to the amazing case study at hand and a huge amount of quality analysis on the subject.  Two pieces that I highly recommend are:

1. This recent radio piece aired on “This American Life.”  The analysis is very good and very easy to understand.  It is an hour long, I think, but well worth every second.

2. The current issue of The Economist has a fantastic article on the money markets.  It’s definitely not an easy read, but I understand the subject much more after digesting this thang.

Some day soon, I’m hoping to have a guest post by a real-life banker/economist (i.e.  someone who actually has a right to talk about all this stuff).

~Chaz

Blog Suspension Suspended

Now that we’ve “dealt” with this crisis, fresh posts are on the way.  Stay tuned.

Game on.

Blog Suspended

In light of the recent economic panic attack, I’ve decided to suspend my blogging to focus on the serious crisis at hand.  I’ll be flying to Washington in a few hours to eat steaks with W, Hank, Ben, that old guy, and the rest of the gang .

Anyone else want to announce a suspension?

~Chaz

Cell Regulatory Mechanisms: miRNA, part 1

Imagine sitting down with your favorite musician for an interview.  You’ve carefully prepared some questions about the new album, one which you’ve enjoyed immensely.  You’ve been nervous about this interview for days, but the conversation flows easily from subject to subject, lyrics, the writing process, and eventually you ask about the recording process.  It turns out that the entire album was recorded on magnetic tape, and in a shocking turn of events, the artist reveals to you that 20 reels of tape were cut down to one for the final product.  In other words, only 5% of the total source material was used, leaving an enormous amount of the original material to be essentially discarded as junk.  Sure, parts of those extra reels are garbage, but a serious fan could probably find some great stuff in there!

Post-Apocalyptico

The Road is set to release in late November of this year.  The book was definitely one of my favorite Cormac McCarthy novels, so in my mind, the film has a lot to live up to.  If these gorgeous, creepy photos are any indication, though, I have a feeling we’ll not be let down by this adaptation…

(photo credit: Macall Polay/Dimension Films)

More shots can be found here.

Also, Nate turned me on to this side of McCarthy.  Apparently, he hangs out with scientists all day (?) … I HAVE to find a way to get in on this!

Banksy, Birmingham AL

The acclaimed British street artist Banksy has recently been in New Orleans doing his thing.  On a tip that he had done at least one piece right here in Birmingham, Arik and I went out on a quest this evening to find it.  The tip said that the piece was around a Home Depot in west Birmingham, so we headed over to the location in Fairfield.  Well, we found a bunch of cool old places around there but gave up as twilight was hitting its stride.  As we were on 59 headed back toward Birmingham, we spotted some folks hanging out around an old abandoned gas station an knew it had to be the place.

A couple of other things that I’m too lazy to formulate into paragraphs …

1.  It’s really impressive in person… large and detailed.  Just in seeing it and comparing it to his other stuff, I’m thinking it really is his work.

2.  There was a lady there who said her granddaughter saw two white males creating it.  She said that it happened really fast, like within 5 minutes.  Supposedly, the piece has been at the location for at least a few days now.

3.  There was also a gentleman there who had just been wired $50 bucks from some dude in NYC to take some photos and email them to him.

Directions:  From Birmingham, go south on 59 until you get to the Bush Blvd Exit.  Take this exit.  Go down the ramp and take a left.  You’ll then go under the interstate and see an abandoned Chevron gas station on your left, maybe 30-50 yards up the street.  That’s the where you want to be.

Keep your eyes peeled … there could be other (maybe more light-hearted) images around the area.  Hopefully Arik will post the some photos soon.  I’ll update with a link so be sure to check back.  ~Chaz

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UPDATE 1 (9.1.08 – 9:30 pm):

Here’s a link to some of the photos.  Note:  this piece was much more grim than most of what has been spotted in New Orleans so far.  If you’re not into dark, somewhat violent art, don’t click.

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UPDATE 2 (9.2.08 – 10:50 am):

I’ve just been informed that most of the piece has been painted over with black spray paint.  The rope is still there.

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UPDATE 3 (9.4.08 – 9:58 pm)

The part of the wall with the image is gone.

On Mp3 (Or “Any a’ y’all seen my mp3 layin’ around the house?…”)

Below are the favorites of what I’ve heard recently, in no particular order.

Yo La Tango – I Can Hear The Heart Beating As One (Matador, 1997) — This is one of those bands with so much depth that it’s always intimidating to even try to find a place to begin to delve in.  I tried with their most recent effort, mainly because of it’s title (I Am Not Afraid of You and I Will Beat Your Ass), but it just didn’t do it for me.  Then Nate shoved this into my ears on the way home from Chehaw the other day and I found my entry point.  This album is fantastic.  Each song is totally different from the last, making this a schizophrenic listening experience that (somehow) works really, really well.  Oh man … the sample track is so hot!      (sample track: damage)

Jay-Z – Reasonable Doubt (Roc-A-Fella, 1996) — Anyone who’s spent any time with me in the past few weeks knows that this album has become somewhat of an obsession.  Sorry, I’m gonna plug it once more and be done.  Debut.  Great production, incredibly well-written lyrics.  Double and even triple meanings, allusion, vivid imagery, wordplay like I’ve never heard before.  Check out the sample track and see the previous post for more links and lyrics.       (sample track: d’evils)

Swervedriver – Raise (A&M, 1991) — Pat hooked me with this track.  I ordered the album off of half.com the next day and was not at all disappointed.  This stuff definitely wreaks of the early 90′s in the best way.  I always hear it as Dinosaur Jr. meets My Bloody Valentine.    (sample track: rave down)

Papa M – Three (Drag City, 2003) — Papa M is an alias for David Pajo, badass extraordinaire.  Kylos (or K’aisle, if you prefer) broke out these numerically titled EPs from 2003 the other night and Pajo blew my earbrain for the umpteenth time.  Three has been my focus so far, but all six sound fantastic.  This sample track is actually an LP version of a track from One, but it’ll give anyone unfamiliar with this guy a good taste.  Did that make any sense?  Oh well …     (sample track: over jordan)

Cool Kids – The Bake Sale (Chocolate Industries, 2008)  — These guys make old-scool sounding hip-hop in current day Chicago.  I hear they originated and gained notoriety on the Spacer.  I like them because they talk about being middle-class and riding pimped-out bicycles around town.  Brandi likes them because they remind her of Ft. Laudi-dawdi circa 1985.    (sample track: mikey rocks)

Songs: Ohia – Songs: Ohia (Secretly Canadian, 1997) — Didn’t It Rain is a masterpiece and one of my favorite albums of all time (If you haven’t heard it, see me for a borrow).  This first self-titled release by Jason Molina has always been good, but thanks to the auto-next-disk-in-the-living-room-disk-changer-phenomenon, I’ve gained a new appreciation for it.  Raw and beautiful.  K’aisle told me that Molina once played an acoustic set to a small audience at Sewanee and every single person in tears.  I don’t doubt that at all.    (sample track: cabwaylingo)

[Let me know if you find any broken links and I'll update.]

Heard anything good lately?  I’d love some recommendations … Boom!    ~Chaz

Seriously?

This clip of has got to be one of the most insane pieces of “reporting” I’ve ever seen.  Here are the highlights for me …

1.  The tag line at the bottom warning about the “leftist protesters.”  Really?  They look more like a bunch of college kids who just got finished shopping at Urban Outfitters…

2.  Griff’s use of the term “freedom of speech.”  Griff seems to think that the first amendment is all about a person’s constitutional compulsion to speak when spoken to.

3.  Griff’s feigned revulsion at all of the naughty words being used as he yells questions while going against the flow of traffic with a camera crew.

4.  Griff’s name.

5.  I really like the way Griff signs out when things start getting a little too rowdy at the protest.  And by “rowdy” he means young people using foul language and gestures.

6.  The concern that the anchorwoman has for Griff toward the end of the clip.  Clearly, he was in a lot of danger so she’s going to check back in with him later to make sure he’s okay.  I must have missed the part where the protesters were burning cars and looting the armory.

Eck.  Cable news is the worst.  I feel like I’m watching bad theater or something.  No more of it On Email, I promise.  Fear not — this weblog remains a one-stop shop, but that shop will never again distribute cable news … because it’s pure filth.  Entertaining in a tragic sort of way, but filth nonetheless.