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I’m pretty sure that Everything I Need To Know I’ve Learned From Iron Maiden is a complete put-on, but I don’t care. When I get in my car today, I’m totally going to cue up Alexander the Great. His name struck fear into hearts of men you know. When I was listening to that song as a 17-year-old nere-do-well, I thought that at the age of 19 he became a wrestling king. Macedon probably makes more sense though.

You know, I was blown away the first time I saw the “Games Without Frontiers” video. There was something so strange about seeing little kids dressed up like adults at a dinner party.

I just saw the video for “Y Control” by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. That video is MESSED UP. Little kids dragging a dead dog around and cutting off their hands with axes and crap. Very creepy and disturbing. This page claims to have a link to it (Real). I didn’t test it, and I don’t know how long it will be a valid link.

I was just thinking tonight that it didn’t feel like we were getting close to Halloween, but maybe now… I don’t know. It was a really creepy video.

For the longest time, I haven’t come across any music that seemed very interesting to me. And, the truth is that I don’t really go out looking for it too much anymore. I’m sure it’s out there somewhere.

I just saw the video for Girl Anachronism by The Dresden Dolls. Wow! There’s this tense kind of urgency to the music. It just builds and builds with a kind of seething undercurrent of anger to it. This is the sound of frustrated longing. Maybe it’s my mood, but I find it incredibly appealing. I want to check it out again tomorrow to see if I have the same reaction.

Drop me a comment if you know of anybody who has this same kind of sound going on. It sounds really fresh and interesting to me.

Man, that new Counting Crows song from the Shrek 2 Soundtrack is trying so hard to be an Elvis Costello song it borders on painful. I actually like a bunch of the Counting Crows stuff, and I love love LOVE Elvis Costello. Those two just do not go well together though.

As long as I’m spouting off about music, for the record (you know ’cause I’m sure everybody cares about what I’m listening to these days) I do really like that Franz Ferdinand song, “Take Me Out”. So much so in fact that I went out and well let’s say sampled the rest of the album on a Usenet Binary group, and I’m sorry to say that I’m not as onboard with a lot of the rest of record.

Monkey was an old Japanese show that spawned the infinitely remixable Monkey Magic.

Reminds me a little of Queens “Flash Gordon” only you know with monkeys and stuff. How can you not love a song with a throw away line like “You’re not a god, you’re a birthday cake!”?

If anybody has a video to go along with one of these mixes, let me know –it could only be spectacular. Thanks Beth. You’re my hero.

A few weeks ago, somebody turned me on to the music of Bob Schneider. He was playing at the Roxy, so tonight I headed up to check him out. Now, even though it was only like 8 PM, I have to confess I was feeling a bit tired as I got in my car, got on the freeway and motored my way up to Hollywood. I gave serious consideration to just baling on the whole thing. But, you only live once, and I don’t want to live it as a decrepit old man, so I grabbed my cane and my geritol and threw on the Pixies. “Whoo Hoo! Rock and Roll!” (please note that of those 3, only the last one was true, and at no time did I actually shout whoo hoo, rock and roll — that’s just the feeling I was trying to work up to)

I got up to Sunset, paid for parking, walked a few blocks to the Roxy, ignored the fact that I felt completely out of place compared to all the hipster kids who were walking past me, got to the box office, and realized with stark horror that the show had sold out. At no point had it even occurred to me to suspect that the show might sell out. This was a Wednesday night show with some dude I’d only ever even heard of a few weeks ago. I guess the Hollywood hipsters must have their ears closer to the ground than I did.

So, back in my car, and back on the freeway, and this time listening to Lucinda Williams (so, not rock ‘n roll*). I got home in time to watch the West Wing and do some laundry. Clearly, I need to stay in the South Bay like a good little three one oher. I am just so completely not two one three (or whatever the hell the area code is in Hollywood these days.

*actually, I think that Lucinda Williams probably is rock ‘n roll in an unrequited alt-country kind of way, but go with me here. It’s a freaking metaphor or something.

I’d never heard of Bob Schneider until somebody linked his site off of MeFi. I’m really liking it though. I’m not sure if it’s the music (although that sounds great in a Pete Yorn, Rocker Singer Songwriter kind of way) or the sense of humor/interesting interface that the site seems to have.

It’s all flash and bandwidth intensive, but it creates a great way to experience the music. He’s in West Hollywood at The Roxy on May 19th. I may just need to go check him out live.

So, if you’re like me, you’ve been seeing Songs to Wear Pants To linked from every site on the internet, but you didn’t click through to check it out. Fool! Click through. Do it now. Do it right now!

Somebody took Billy Joel’s history lesson, “We Didn’t Start the Fire”, and made an annotated version of the lyrics. Now if only I could find somebody to do the same thing with the theme song from “Cheers”.

Seriously though, I’d never heard of George Santayana before reading this annotation, and I’m genuinely amazed that I hadn’t. He sounds like a profound and influential figure in American thought. My education blew. via

There was a time when I absolutely loved Jonatha Brooke’s music. I listen to those songs now, and I just don’t hear them the same anymore for some reason.

And the new album, Back in the Circus ….. Well, yeah. That’s too bad. Although “Better After All” does kind of grab me. I think it’s just a few oddly specific phrases more than anything. “Less Than Love” is kind of cool too, but it feels like it could have been so much more.

She’s coming to concert in Southern California in April. I saw her once before, and she’s great live. Good crowd interaction, it could be fun. I’m tempted to check it out, but I don’t know. I may have changed too much. It’s sad.

Where’s the new music that’s going to grab my soul? I’m so ready for something to grab me (as I listen to the same songs over and over again on my iPod because radio is so… well, just so)