Money Doesn't Grow On Trees--It Does, However, Tend to Blow Amongst Heavy Traffic on Sunset Boulevard at Opportune Moments

If you're the person in Los Angeles who lost that $100 bill I found lying in the street this past weekend, please write me immediately so I can thank you from the bottom of my heart. That green sure came in handy when Amoeba Records had that rare used version of Recombo DNA, the internet-only limited-edition 2-CD comp of outtakes and demos by robotic New Wave pioneers Devo. Can you imagine how your inability to keep track of your moolah has instantly enriched my life? Now I can listen to Sloppy (I Saw My Baby Gettin') (demo) and Girl U Want (demo alternate version) whenever I damn well please without ever having to resort to the shameful practice of illegal downloading. Thanks to your nimble wallet, my disposition is so sunny I even find myself listening to the tracks made during their later barely-interesting period following their surprising chart success. I hope to be in your area again in three weeks--do you think you can see to losing another $100 dollar bill during my upcoming visit? And a little closer to my hotel wouldn't hurt, either.

Prank Calling About the Fictitious Forthcoming Boxed Set from Sufjan Stevens

Music Store Geek Girl: This is [name of local alternative rock record chain store] on [street name].
Disco:Very: Hello. I’m calling about the new Sufjan Stevens boxed set.
Music Store Geek Girl: [Professional and helpful because she appears to be a Sufjan Stevens fan, a part of the ruse for which I hadn't planned] Mmmm…I haven’t heard of this. Huh! Wow! Do you know the title?
Disco:Very: See, that’s why I’m calling. I don’t know the name of it. He’s realizing it’s going to take him forever to record an album for each of the 50 American states--
Music Store Geek Girl: [On the edge of her seat] Uh huh…yeah…
Disco:Very: --and so he’s decided it would be quicker to simply record his own version of albums recorded by bands who are named after the 50 states. So he’s, you know, recording his own version of Point of Know Return by Kansas, and he’s recording his own version of American Pride by Alabama...
Music Store Geek Girl: So he’s going to record those albums all over again?
Disco:Very: Right, he’s going to record those albums note-for-note with the original band--
Music Store Geek Girl: Really??
Disco:Very: --and record each album with that band as his backing band.
Music Store Geek Girl: [Getting more excited] Oh my god! Really? That is so cool!
Disco:Very: He’s also going to insist that they wear Boy Scout shirts with butterfly wings on the back.
Music Store Geek Girl: It’s weird that I haven’t heard of this boxed set, ‘cuz I’m a big fan of his stuff.
Disco:Very: And angel wings. They’ll have to wear angel wings and butterfly wings at the same time in the studio while they’re backing him.
Music Store Geek Girl: Well, so…[thinking]…when is this supposed to come out because I’m not finding it on our release dates.
Disco:Very: I don’t know. I just read about it in Paste Magazine and it’s just a little sidebar column which says it’s going to be a boxed set—a really big boxed set!--released in April.
Music Store Geek Girl: [Getting more excited] Oh my god! Well, let me…let me…hang on a sec.
[Goes to chat with someone in the stock room, taking a little too long to get back to me.]
Music Store Geek Girl: I’m not finding anything in our upcoming releases list so do you know the label?
Disco:Very: I don’t know the label either. I just know that he’s doing as many albums as there are bands named after states and when he runs out of those, he’ll move on and record albums by bands named after cities like Berlin and Nazareth and Boston, and then when he runs out of those, he’s going to record albums by heavy metal bands named after Biblical cities destroyed by God because of their wickedness.
Music Store Geek Girl: Um...[slowly realizing this might be a prank.]
Disco:Very: So he’s going to record Masquerade In Blood by the band Sodom...do you know the band Sodom?
Music Store Geek Girl: [Silence].
Disco:Very: The city of Sodom is where the word "sodomy" comes from. And it's where the totally hot practice of sodomy comes from as well.
Music Store Geek Girl: [Silence.]
Disco:Very: It was invented there. [I attempt a theatrical Italian accent.] And it became-a the big-ah hit-ah around the world-ah! Everybody-ah love-ah da sodomy!
Music Store Geek Girl: [Hangs up.]
Disco:Very: Hello?