The Ronstadt Center

While I'm excited to hear that Califone have a new album forthcoming (Roots And Crowns on October 10th), I'm even more thrilled to see the band using Linda Ronstadt as the lead actress in the music video for Spider's House. It's her most stunning performance since her jaw-dropping rendition of "We Will Rock You". When will you be loved, Linda? Nobody could accuse you of "being no good"! And speaking of being no good, Disco:Very is going to be out and away for the next five days, taking in 4 full non-stop 12-hour days and nights of movies, movies, movies at the Telluride Film Festival. If any of my thousands of readers are also attending, please wave me down if you see me. I'll be the one wearing pants. [Also, in case this joke mystifies you, I'm saying that the creature in the photo is Linda Ronstadt. You're welcome.]

Language: I secretly wish I was Hanzi Smatter, dedicated to documenting the misuse of Chinese characters in Western Culture

Websites: There is only one thing worse than having an Open Web Letter addressed to you, and that is not having an Open Web Letter addressed to you.

Inventions: Well, sir, there's nothing on earth like a genuine, bona fide, electrified, six-car monorail!

Toys: Sure, these "vinyl figures based on Club Gods" are cute and all, but why not create an action-figure blogger while you're at it?

Entertainment: The only thing worse than seeing your picture on Hot Hollywood Assistants is being the Hot Hollywood Assistant to Courtney Love.

Crafts: These deranged stitcheries of Patricia Waller are not the kind of stuffed dolls you can bring home to meet your parents.

Art: Finally, an invention for the lazy anarchist spray painter in all of us.

Fashion: For anyone seeking future stardom on a reality series, Pre-Pixelated T-Shirts.

Fun & Games: Please. I already hate karaoke enough, thank you.

Animation: The Egg Lady is rolling over in her grave.

Antiques: He collects everything, so you don't have to.

DVDs: The what-took-them-so-fucking-long release of The Day I Became A Woman, and the hurry-up-before-I-pee-my-pants reissue of Playtime, are making the world a better place.

Food: I used to think there wasn't anything I couldn't enjoy eating. I was wrong.

I Find You Intoxicating

Alcohol is an improvement, not an impairment. Take a listen to the mighty Balfa Brothers performing La Valse des Bombaches twice: the first time, seemingly sober (taken from The Balfa Brothers Play Traditional Cajun Music.) The second time, drunker than Haley Joel Osment looking up my skirt after being soaked overnight in a gallon of Night Train (this track found on the Rounder Records release Louisiana Cajun French Music, Volume One.) The choice is obvious: Thunder, meet Bird. I now pronounce you shit-faced.

A Pick Up (And A Pickup)

There are only three things which make me click my heels in a rush of orgiastic ecstasy: 1) puppy breath, 2) microwave popcorn (organic), and 3) walking into the local chain entertainment store and picking up a barely-played used copy of the Can masterpiece Tago Mago after years of avoiding buying it new because why should I give anyone $18 for a recording from over 30 years ago? Besides, I mostly just play Oh Yeah over and over so what's the point in paying full price? I was also delighted to find a barely-played used DVD of the Samuel Fuller masterpiece Pickup On South Street but let's not go there, girlfriend! (I was recently informed this phrase is making an ironic comeback and I'm hoping to be ahead of the curve.)

The Jade Tree of The Jaded

Emory the Emo Emu has lost his way and can't figure out which Emo band listed below is for real and which ones are merely fakes saddled with terrible names! Can you help him find out the truth?

Eyelash Wishes
As Tall As Lions
Climbing The Branches, Touching The Sky
Birth, Life, Death
Nothing More Than This
Under The Influence Of Giants
Rainfall/Rainbow
Her Vagina, Smiling
While My Guitar Gently Weeps
These Arms Are Snakes
The Ground Below, The Sun Above
Tears As Wide As Rivers
I Ache, You Ache, We All Ache For Romantic Disillusionment-Ache
The Pillow, Tear-Stained
From Ashes Rise
Crushed And Put Away
Clouds of Ennui
My Shriveled Manhood In Your Hands
Blame The Stars
Four Walls Falling
That Darkly Comic Scene in Harold And Maude (You Know The One)
Cast Down, Again and Again
Really Funereal
allinlowercasewithoutspaces
Young Widows
Blue Balls Of Romance

(Answer: It was a trick question. Real or not, they're all saddled with terrible names.)

Rock Softly And Carry A Big Schtick

If we're to believe the article seen in the September 2006 issue of Spin, muscally tepid acts such as Okkervil River, Foutains Of Wayne and Ryan Adams have been publicly embracing the snooze-inducing tunes by such squishy-core mid-70's outfits as Hall and Oates, America, Supertramp and the artistically reprehensible Bread. The day I'm forced to listen to softy-pop 70's folksters as a new cutting-edge schtick tactic, I'll toss my weight behind The Boat Family, a quirky (quasi political) ditty recorded by The Roches--the only sibling singers slightly less weird than The Jacksons. While I'm unable to decipher exactly how the "piece of chocolate" singing to us in the introductory verse suddenly skips towards the issue of ocean-bound immigration by the end, this track has already given me more hours of enjoyment than a single line from "Baby I'm A Want You."

The Right Stuffs

Have any of you heard the news about this huge scandal swirling around Mel Gibson? Apparently there is a video circulating showing him stuffing his chubby Right Wing face and loudly burping while his long-suffering boyfriend Kevin Federline looks on, and...no, wait. I think I got the story wrong. Wasn't it Prince William drunkenly grabbing the boob attached to one Lindsay Lohan at a posh London nightclub (or was it Oprah Winfrey's lesbian husband)? You see, this is the confusion which comes of working utterly exhausting 12-hour days several weeks in a row. The blogging suffers, my mind suffers, you suffer...the entire web suffers! Perhaps it's best to just play the music, in this case, the not-at-all-in-the-news Jewish faith, best exemplified by electronic maven Gershon Kingsley as he cooks up a little kosher Kiddush (or is it Kaddish)? Thanks to tunes like Security Song, the entire God Is A Moog album is like a post-Follies-era Stephen Sondheim musical about the joys of circumcision laced with Moog farts. You could say this Shabbat ain't too shabby.

Bizarro World

If you had told me, 20 years ago when I first laid eyes on bizarro brother pop act Sparks that they were someday going to achieve no small amount of critical acclaim late in their career, I would have punched you in the larynx. But here's where it gets really weird: their latest album gets hoisted upon the public by punk scuzz noise merchants In The Red Records (wha..?) followed by Wounded Bird Records reissuing their first two albums, the self-titled Sparks and A Woofer In Tweeter's Clothing. Most surprising is just how good these two early efforts are. The former chugs along nicely thanks to Girl From Germany and Whippings And Apologies, while the latter boasts the heavy hooks of Wonder Girl and Saccharin And The War. Neither reissue provides much-needed liner notes, but considering my man Ron Mael was rockin' the Hitler mustache when these two albums were recorded circa 1972, it's a wonder they've survived to tell the tale this long after the fact.

Pogos Going Steady

Singles Only, the Japanese-import collection of 7-inchers by the long-in-the-tooth Seattle foursome The Briefs traffics in the usual fist-in-the-air pogo pop we know all too well (check out Benny's Got A Cigarette, We Americans and Medication and you get the general idea). For me, the Urine of Excitement starts to flow when they vow karmic retribution towards the musically reprehensible Bob Seger during the blazing sing-along Silver Bullet. If you can find a more stirring anthem this year, I'll eat my dayglo wraparound shades.

Abortion Is God's Way Of Checking The Guest List And Saying "I'm Sorry, And You Are...?"

Isn't anyone else mortified by Safeway's new slogan, "From Your Fetus To Our Store"? Are they proposing to eat America's babies? Why can't President Bush do something about this rampant disregard for human life? Every time a man masturbates into a sock--killing off more of the world's drastically limited supply of sperm--we run the risk of wiping out the entire human population. Every stem cell has the potential of becoming a mystical adult contemporary pop star along the lines of Stevie Nicks. Even when she and Lindsay Buckingham (then known simply as Buckingham Nicks) were unknown, unwanted walking sperm 'n' eggs wandering neon-infested Sunset Boulevard hoping to score a record deal with tracks such as Long Distance Winner and Stephanie, their lives had as much value as any petri dish of test-tube experiments you'd care to name. Sadly, this preemie LP is their only pre-Fleetwood Mac release, and because these songs are Buckingham Nick's precious babies, keeping them from being "born again" is akin to committing infanticide on a level not seen since the great Christian bonfire of albums back in 1966, when The Beatles were more popular with groupies than their main competitor Jesus.

Mother Sky, Sister Moon

Sometimes, when La Luna is aligned with Sagittarius, I shuffle over to the stereo in my oversize kaftan and put on Mother Sky from Can's 2nd album Soundtracks and I just jam and jam and jam, shaking my dreadlocks until they're sore and begging for a good shampoo. Later, I strip down, put on a crisp white shirt (making sure my long translucent neck is jutting out of the collar, buttoned to the top) and play A Kitchen In The Clouds from the Come On compilation The Come On Story, all the while cutting my balding wispy hair to a choppy length. When I look in the mirror, I remind myself that I've been alive forever, and I wrote the very first song. I put the words and the melodies together. I am music and I write the songs.

Back To Your Future

Remember back in January 2006 when I sent some of you my year-end picks Best-Of-2005 CD? And remember how so many of you mocked me and scolded me and bruised my precious feelings for putting the Cansei De Ser Sexy track Acho Um Pouco Bom on there? But now they're the Next Big Thing and you're all listening to their Sub Pop debut and dancing around the house to Off The Hook and Alcohol and Fuck Off Is Not The Only Thing You Have To Show (even though the original Brazil-only version called Fuck Off Rock is so much better)? Well, get ready to emotionally abuse me once again later this year because I predict--thanks to tracks like Wild Moose Party and Siam--I predict the dance-y New Wave B-52's-ness of The Cosmopolitans is going to make them bigger than Jesus, Buddha and L. Ron Hubbard combined. Except that CSS are relatively new and The Cosmopolitans split up 25 years ago. Other than that, my gods can kill your gods.

¿Cuál es Más Cobarde?

For many years, I have held the belief that Sly & The Family Stone's Loose Booty from 1974's first-comeback-in-a-long-series-of-comebacks Small Talk is The Supremo Funky Burrito, triumphantly holding its arms aloft, trophy in hand, as The Funkiest Song Of All Time. Sly holds the title but Ly Ngua O is the challenger with Vo Chong Lam Bieng, as heard on the Trikont comp Ho! Vietnam Roady Music. Who will win this coveted position, and who will hang their head in shame as they abdicate the throne in bitter defeat? I'm not sure I know the answer, but I'm pretty sure headbutting will be involved.

I've Seen Fire And I've Seen Rain, I've Seen Bloody Days Covered In Blood With Freshly Killed Blood That I Thought Would Never End

To hear the mighty/mellow tracks by folk fiends The You, one would assume the largest injury they'd sustain is Toe-Tappin'-itus, brought on by the mellow easy-going rhythms they conjure. Yet their My Space page shows a battered axe covered with splashes of crimson blood. Good lord, what hell hath James Taylor wrought??? I can't imagine a song such as I'm Going To Kill Myself--despite its morbid title--would lead to such violent mayhem. Perhaps producer du jour Brian Deck (Iron & Wine, Modest Mouse) slashed some skin trying to create a major label silk purse out of an indie-budget sow's ear. Or just maybe the guy on the far right of the photo above physically harmed someone after being told one too many times about his resemblance to not-a-homo thespian Tom Cruise. Either way, should they venture to perform in your hometown, bring plenty of gauze and surgical tape.  [Update: their MySpace page seems to have gone the way of...well, MySpace.]

Ergo > Therefore

Not Going To Bed (the new single from Andrew WK) is to I Won't Grow Up (from Peter Pan) as Tom Verlaine's All Weirded Out is to Psychotic Reaction. Discuss.

Radical Dude

The anticipation has got me breaking out in hives. I simply cannot wait until Justin Timberlake radically changes the face of pop music as we know it. We have been suffering under the constraints of Jimmie Haskell & His Orchestra for far too long. Free us, Justin! Free us from the shackles of We Get Messages, Weightless Blues, Asteroid Hop and Rockin' In The Orbit! And while you're at it, can you radically change the face of popular cinema as well? I have a feeling you'd be able to show Snakes On A Plane a thing or two.

It Takes One To Know One

George W. Bush and I are a lot alike. For starters, we are both former dum-dum coke-inhaling frat boy alcoholics who only wrangled our way into Yale thanks to our father slipping some green towards the school. Second, we've both been wasting our time and energy: he on Iraq (anyone with half a brain could have told you North Korea is more dangerous than Saddam Hussein), me on latter day ELO (anyone with half a brain could have told you ELO 2 is more dangerous than Out Of The Blue.) I mean, jeez, just listen to Momma... and Born To Die. Don't they make you just...I don't know...want to clear that never-ending brush which seems to creep up on your Texas ranch every vacation time?

Wrap Yourself In Furze

Someday, perhaps in the very near future, Scar Stuff is going to find himself bereft of cheez-ee Halloween albums to post. When that happens, I warmly offer my growing collection of bizarro heavy metal CD's, most of which wallow in the same anti-art which puts the "horror" back in "horrible". Case in point: Seance by Furze, which despite the singer's earnest attempts, is about as frightening as Charlie Brown draped in a hole-y bedsheet.

Homo Nucleus

Camp sensibility and outsider pop smarts walk arm in arm down the wedding aisle in the newest Trikont confection From The Closet To The Charts: Queer Noises, 1961-1978. Deftly juggling the well-known (The Ramones, The Kinks) with the unknown (Trouble At The Cup by Black Randy & The Metro Squad), there's a track here for just about everyone. The stereotypical swishy queen (These Boots by Teddy & Darrel) nuzzles next to wtf?? anomalies (White Trash Hillbilly Trick by Peter Grudzien), intermingled with the occasional way-cool surprise (The Twinkeyz' Aliens In Our Midst). Sadly, lesbians are forced to the back of the bus (Polly Perkins' Coochy Coo is outnumbered 23 to 1) but the entertainment value is so strong overall, maybe we can let it slide while waiting for the potential 2nd volume to rectify this oversight, hint hint. The formerly-MIA Caesar Tjalbo has the entire album available for download, if you're feeling adventurous.

"F" Is For (Not) Fake

The same exercise in futility which drives The Nazi Pope to ask why God was silent during the Holocaust sometimes propels me to stare at my overburdened CD storage shelves and ask why they can't magically increase in size to meet the demands of my bulging music collection. Most of the blame can go to my generous spirit: when copying CD's for myself, I always copy extras to lend to others, often resulting in 10 extra copies taking up valuable shelf space. Therefore, in an attempt to alleviate the already maxxed-out row of CD's filed under "F", I invite you to send me an e-mail with your name (phony is fine) and address, after which I will send you a CD of your choice: 1) the self-titled deadpan debut of New Wave pioneers The Flying Lizards, 2) The Good Earth, the Velvet-y sophomore effort by The Feelies (produced by Peter Buck of REM), 3) It's Only Right And Natural, the mostly-improvised queer/not queer folk-punk album by The Frogs (sampled by Beck on Odelay) or 4) the original version of My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts (which contains the track "Qu'ran", now unavailable on subsequent reissues) by Brian Eno & David Byrne (I am aware this CD falls under "E", so don't bother to point it out--I know more than you do.)
The fine print: This offer is not a fake. I will send you one CD free of charge (two CDs if you give me a good reason for being so selfish.) Your address will not be used for future unsolicited mailings. You will owe me nothing in return. I don't have to like you and you don't have to like me. You will not receive any spam in the future (well, at least not from Disco:Very.) Each CD in the overcrowded "F" shelf was chosen precisely because it is out-of-print and therefore not denying anyone a royalty check. If you are a member of The Flying Lizards, The Feelies, The Frogs, or happen to be Brian Eno and/or David Byrne, please don't sue me. I give because I love.

I Repeat Myself When Under Stress

Close personal pal Puss, after years of collecting my free-to-anyone-who-asks annual year-end best-of CD compilations, commented that I must really love drawn-out repetition in music. It's true. I love drawn-out repetition in music. It's true. I love drawn-out repetition in music. It's true. I love drawn-out repetition in music. It's true. I love drawn-out repetition in music. It's true. I love drawn-out repetition in music. It's true. I love drawn-out repetition in music. It's true. I love drawn-out repetition in music. It's true. I love drawn-out repetition in music. It's true. I love drawn-out repetition in music. It's true. I love drawn-out repetition in music. Why else would I covet Circle-offshoot Itavayla and their bizarro/electro ZZ Top-esque tumble in the hay on tracks such as Future Boogie and Tesco? Please note: quoting a King Crimson lyric is a concession to those upset over the missing umlauts.

Listen To A Weird Noise Band

More than a few of the compositions compiled on Another Wasted Sunday Afternoon concern themselves with the Us vs. Them state of mind dominating hearts and minds immediately following the emergence of early punk. Instant Automatons gave a snarling yet humorous report from the frontlines, whether the topic be on one's look (Short Haired Man), lifestyle habits (Gillian Is Normal) or musical choices (People Laugh At Me, Electronic Music.) With their stripped-down lo-fi electro-fuckery and who-gives-a-shit? vocal delivery, fans of The Fall, Wire and Swell Maps would better their lives to pick this one up. The good folks at Hyped2Death.com have sifted through hours of music to excavate the best 70 minutes of music you will ever find running through your head day and night. Do I have to draw you a diagram?

The Rise And Fall Of The Third Reich and Roll

"Girlfriend came out at just the right historic moment...riding the tidal wave kicked up by Nirvana's Nevermind and helping to fill the void that had been created by the instant obsolescence of the music of the '80's..." - excerpt from liner notes in just-released 2-CD edition of Matthew Sweet's 1991 album Girlfriend

The bloody battle begun just months earlier was finally coming to an end. Trapped in their reinforced bunker nestled deep underground, a handful of big-haired pop stars (including Whitney Houston, Cyndi Lauper and A-Ha) paced their cramped quarters, cyanide tablets at the ready lest they should fall into the hands of Colonel Cobain and his ragtag army of flannel-flying punk liberationists. The sonic bombardments continued apace from above, creating an instant obsolescence of all 80's music. Vince Neal, croutched in a dark room below, was preparing to die from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head, agonizing over the distress and betrayal of seeing Decade of Decadance, the Motley Crue quickie greatest-hits collection released earlier that year, failing to reach the dramatic heights in sales of Nevermind. Meanwhile, reinforcements from Seattle marched on: Mudhoney continued their destructive carnage southward (towards Los Angeles), single-handedly overtaking the Coconut Teaszer, while the more unconventional advance attacks of The Butthole Surfers drew in from the southeast. As the Mighty Pop Empire lay in ruins, a severed hand fitted into a single white glove--torn, somewhat hidden by fallen debris and charred almost beyond recognition--was the last remaining symbol of a once formidable influence over a generation. As Emperor Mellencamp signed the Treaty of Surrender, Matthew Sweet and his band took advantage of this unique surge of freedom--a tidal wave, if you will--to perform Divine Intervention, followed by the original demo of Winona, to mark the slow passing of wartime into a newfound spirit of peace, prosperity and neo-primitive Maori tattoo markings going mainstream on biceps across the land.

Bling It On

It's a clever marketing angle, naming your 20th-something album Introduction despite the band/band leader whiling away in obscurity for 40 years. If such trickery leads unknowing listeners to take a gander at the loosely-tight meanderings of Vexations, Note To Selves and It Will Be (Delivered), all the better. This is The Red Krayola's most accessible album, but considering Mayo Thompson's previous track record, this is a relative assessment. The knowing wink of coupling caustic aural chaos with the slang title of closing track Bling Bling says just about everything you need to know.

If I'd Have Known The World Was Ending I'd Have Baked A Cake

This is what the A Frames excel at: they write rock's biggest dumbest guitar riff--bigger and dumber than your head--then proceed to rub your face into it for the duration of an entire song. Cool enough, but when they top it off with deadpan apocalyptic/paranoid rants, it's the icing on the de-evolution cake. NASA should be sending out galactic radio waves of Ionic, Modula and Search And Rescue so other inhabitants of the universe can hear what Earth's final days sound like when set to music.

Insane In The Membrane

If there was an international contest held to name The World's Laziest Human, I would win before the race even began owing to the fact I'd be napping through the whole event. General laziness is the reason I rarely bother to digitally transfer all the thousands of albums I own. I have owned the LP-only comp of 1960's French rock tunes Ils Sont Fous Ces Gaulois (Vol. 2) for years but the idea of all the work it would take to convert the whole thing to mp3 files makes my eyelids go into a deep coma. And really, why bother when if you wait long enough, Elsebasto will do it for you? Maybe someday Monsieur Elsebasto will have the energy to tell us what Loups Tous Les Soirs is going on about. [Update: Elsebasto appears to be dead. Or no longer blogging. Or both.]

The Hardest Button To Button

It's no secret that I loves me some youthful retro New Wave dance rock. When I hear bands like Avenpitch--on tracks such as Butterfly Radio, Dusseldorf and Jack The Idiot Dance--they get me moving and grooving, instantly pushing all the right Electroclash buttons. Do you like my Electroclash buttons? I bet you do. Go ahead, you can push them. Yeah, right there, push them softly. Softer. No, a little softer. Yeah, that's it. Ooooh, yes, tell me you like those buttons. Tell me your friends like my buttons. Tell me your friends are jealous that you're pushing my buttons. Aren't these the nicest buttons you've ever pushed? Treat those naughty buttons a little rough if you want. Go ahead--teach those Electroclash buttons who's boss. Ouch! Ow! Hey, not that rough. Jeez, what do I look like, Pamela Anderson?

Easy Like Sunday Morning

DiscoColonVery.net interrupts the World Wide Web for the following announcement: After years of quest, I have finally found a song by Mogwai that I actually like: Acid Food off Mr. Beast. Yes, it's one of their "easier" songs (i.e. it doesn't screech and howl like early Sonic Youth.) Does that make me easy? It takes one to know one.

Cuts From A Hearty Stalk

It's amazing the amount of attention you can get stalking record companies via persistent pesky e-mails. The iconic New Zealand label Flying Nun has personally assured me--little ol' me!--that the very rare cassette compiliation Oddities 2, which assembles live and unreleased tracks by The Clean & The Great Unwashed, will finally be reissued on cd for the first time later this year. I can only meagerly repay them by urging you to buy the 2-cd set Cuts, which collects almost everything recorded by Toy Love, the late-70's/early-80's outfit made up in part of Chris Knox and Alec Bathgate of Tall Dwarfs. You'll get a headrush buzz from the pogo/thrash sing-alongs of Pull Down The Shades, Ain't It Nice, Toy Love Song and Don't Ask Me but when you injure yourself, don't expect me to take any of the blame.

It's A Family Affair

Longtime guitar cultist Richard Thompson is the forgotten uncle at the family reunion who, when you finally tear yourself away from the more short-term entertaining relatives with their bawdy jokes and staged screaming matches, turns out to be the most wise and charismatic of the bunch. That is to say, he's usually not the first artist coming to mind when I'm trolling around the web looking for downloads. When I do happen to stumble upon his music, I'm always surprised at how enriching most of it can be. How pleasant, then, to find Chocoreve offering RT: The Life And Music Of Richard Thompson (top left), the just-released retrospective with what has to be the ugliest boxed set graphics ever created. For dessert, you'll want to head to the buffet table of 8 Days In April which is posting the original efforts (eventually scrapped and re-recorded) of Thompson's masterpiece Shoot Out The Lights (scroll down a bit to find it.)

Pound For Pound For Pound

My black little heart does flips when Kelly Stoltz taps his inner "Chopsticks". That primitive piano pounding! pounding! pounding! is the primal pulse that courses through all our veins. Sure, anyone can slap those keys into submission the way he does in Prank Calls and Wave Goodbye but isn't that the point? His forays into blues pop (Birdies Singing) are compelling, as are his sad and weeply ballads (Words) but bottom line: I'm waiting for the man to return to those I'm Waiting For The Man rhythms that makes my blood vessels perform cartwheels.

Drum's Not Dead

The pop marketplace is a harsh mistress. Trying to sell Showtunes, Stephin Merritt's fey Chinese opera sountrack, to even the most ardent fan of The Magnetic Fields is going to be difficult. This rewarding but challenging work concerns a complex storyline taking place during the Ming Dynasty, thereby automatically overloading it with pretext (and pretense). It isn't likely to heat up the Billboard charts on the strengths of Little Maiden Of The Sea or And He Would Say... alone and is probably in need of a lot of controversy to shift units. I recommend a well-placed quote from Merritt proclaiming The Flower Drum Song as the best musical in American theatre, followed by frequent live renditions of "I Enjoy Being A Girl".

Get Your Freak (Flag) On

Good grief, is this fucking Folk Freak coup ever going to fizzle out? C'mon, we all found a lot of 90's IDM excessively stark and sterile, but that doesn't mean you should rebel by channeling crystals and spelling "wilderness" with a capital W. You know the trend has become twisted when even Matador chases bands such as Brightblack Morning Light. No doubt, they're going to hit it big with the Whitey-Ashamed-Of-Not-Being-Ethnic crowd. Tracks such as Everybody Daylight contain all the trappings of a Bonnaroo bonanza: the freeform flutes, the connection to freak queen Devendra Banhart, the Earth First! leanings, etc. Jeez, guys, we all embrace Eco-Terrorism but that doesn't mean it sounds good set to music. Maybe they'll take some lessons from Vetiver, the SF ensemble, also linked to Banhart, but who don't seem to be lysergically damaged. If anything, judging from Idle Ties and You May Be Blue (off their newbie To Find Me Gone), they have more of a latter-day Wilco-esque pop vibe going on, which will make existence a bit more uplifting when we're all forced to live off the land after the impending global warming catastrophe. That worthless flute can be used as a straw to suck water off the melting polar ice caps.

Bootie Duty

Will you continue to be my cyber-homie if I let you in on a shameful little secret? I still find myself getting excited about Mash-Ups. Yes, yes, how very 2001 of me. Pardon my blooper, but after a long day at work, I just want to kick back, loosen my boxer briefs, relax with a plate of microwaved Twinkies and enjoy me some bastard pop. You can understand, then, why The Best Of Bootie 2005 has got my heart all a-flutter. True, it's no As Heard On Radio Soulwax, Part 2--some of the tracks don't quite have the juice, such as Hot Rich Girls Dropped In A Grange (Gwen Stefani vs. Snoop Dogg vs. ZZ Top), while others seem to have relied solely on a lucky break (I could have mashed It Takes Two To Kiss (Rob Base vs. Prince) in my sleep.) The tracks that work, however, have a joie de vie that makes you slap your forehead in amazement (why nobody ever thought to make Gary Numan's "Cars" go "Boom" before is difficult to fathom.) Your only duty should be to download the entire album here, artwork and all.

It's Got A Good Beat, and You Can Dance To It (While Receiving Coded Messages to Assassinate Your Enemies)

Has anyone ever remixed a recording from The Conet Project as a dance track? If the answer is no, what the hell is the holdup? Is it due to the cost of owning the entire 4-CD boxed set? Well, these sites are just giving it away, so we've just knocked down that excuse. Wouldn't the cute 'n' cuddly achtung baby hissing those emphatic Germanic orders on The Swedish Rhapsody sound cool behind a thumpin' groove? It would be chillin' and chilling at the same time. Until some formerly-hot DJ gets off his ass and makes it happen--I'm looking at you, John "Jellybean" Benitez--the closest we're going to get is probably Punk Anderson's mid-90's club staple People, which retains most of the Teutonic goose-step but leaves out Conet's creepy Cold War ghostly vibe.

Freshly Stumped

I can name, on one hand, all the bands signed to Minty Fresh that I've ever liked. Specifically, one hand turned-bloody-stump after severing all my fingers in a ghastly blade saw accident. How surprising, then, that my latest obsession--French dance/punk New Wavers Prototypes (not to be confused with British dance/rock New Romantics The Prototypes)--have signed on Minty's dotted line. While their groove thang has been selling itself worldwide for many a moon, they'll only begin receiving U.S. exposure when their forthcoming self-titled album is released June 6th. Until then, you should thank me--nay, praise me!--for giving you an early leg-up with Danse sur la Merde, Gentleman, Exister and Autonomie. If you can't wait two more precious weeks for the rest of their life-altering output, take your mouse for a walk over to their official website. Or skip ye, oh merrily to Amazon (USA division), Amazon (UK division), Amazon (French division), Amazon (Canadian division), Amazon (German division), Amazon (Japanese division), Amazon (Antartica division), Amazon (Martian division), Amazon (People Who Have Trouble Living In This Galaxy division) and Amazon (Porcelin Pussy division).

Make A Run For The Border

Normally, I am not an advocate for nostalgia. Normally, I'm all like, "[dial tone][beep beep beep, beep beep beep beep][ring, ring, ring] Hello, Nostalgia Police? I've got an emergency situation I'd like to report. A seminal band, only recently discovered by the pop intelligentsia 30 years after they split the scene, has decided to cash in on their newfound popularity, and I'm fearing the worst: I believe they're planning a reunion concert! How fast can you get here??" But, and I've got a big but, this is Os Mutantes we're talking about. Yeah, brotha: Os Fucking Mutantes. They've decided to hit the spotlight again (without original member Rita Lee) and if you're one of the luckies who has been able to see them play, well bully for you, you smug little shit. Who did you have to sleep with to get those tickets? The rest of us will have to make do with Baby Borderline providing a download (sadly, WMA only) of Rosetta Stone proportions, capturing a show from May 22nd held at the Barbicanin in London. The Baby (as I like to call it) also provides a link for a free download of The Avalanche, the forthcoming outtakes cd by the now-backlash-bound Sufjan Stevens (via Polaroid Rainbow, but you didn't hear that from me.) Get both of them now before someone confiscates the goods.