It's All In Your Mind, Jenna Elfman

It stands to reason that the not-at-all-psychotic religion Scientology needs more money now that they'll be spending millions fighting fraud in a French courtroom. It's a shame potential celeb contributors who might be able to assist financially are either dead (Sonny Bono, Isaac Hayes) or their careers are (Karen Black, Edgar Winter). What's a murderous secretive cult to do? Thank goodness Beck stepped up to the plate (or the altar or the severed goat's head or whatever the fuck they use in their weird-ass Scientology services) to reissue his mostly-acoustic 1994 opus One Foot in the Grave. While it might not net the big bucks Tom Cruise brought them on...uh, Lions for Lambs (cough), there should be enough owners of the original release who'd want to shell out $16 clams for the 16 additional outtakes (including Feather In Your Cap, Mattress, Whiskey Can Can and It's All In Your Mind) which round out this collection. But it's not like Mr. Hansen isn't trying to do his part in keeping the Good Ship Scientology from sinking--heck, if his acting job as the ice cream scooper nerd in that new Verizon commercial is any indication, he's going to be padding the Scientology coffers for a long time to come! [Update: The Verizon commercial has been removed so this last joke is now lost to history, but trust me--the dude looked exactly like Beck.]

Poi Dog Pondering Have Left the Building--Will All of Their...HOLY SHIT, THEY'RE BACK! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES! SOMEONE DUG THEM UP FROM THE GRAVE! AAUGH!

You are always greeted by a multitude of shocking experiences when shopping the mega-enormous Amoeba Records in Hollywood. To start, there is that final tally to your charge card. Second, you'll spot releases by bands whose break-up you had assumed was a done deal. [You mean to tell me the fucking reprehensible Poi Dog Pondering is still together and was somehow allowed to release a new fuddy-duddy hippy-dippy album???]

But the largest jolt to the system isn't even the myriad of celebs spotted as you traverse the densely-packed record aisles. No, the most jarring moment is when one of those celebrities (hello, Giovanni Ribisi, you dimwitted Scientology freak!) spies you placing a sub-par Vince Guaraldi disc into your shopping basket. "Silly Pre-Clear," he clucks in your direction. "Everyone knows that Guaraldi peaked with A Charlie Brown Christmas. Sure, the pleasant previously-unreleased outtake Nobody Else ascends somewhat close to the genius of the well-known Xmas soundtrack, but after that you are forced to endure the faux funky Woodstock's Dream and the dentist's office dullness of Never Again. Only when you audit yourself of past traumatic Body Thetans, as I have, can you attain my infinite peace and wisdom."

"No offense, Giovanni," you think to yourself while reading his mind (a gift from birth received without benefit of an E-Meter.) "But I saw you in SubUrbia and if that's Serenity of Being, I'll stick to being an aberration, thanks."

My New Year's Resolutions

1. In 2007, I vow to finally "get" bands whose talents currently leave me scratching my head in utter dismay (i.e., The Raconteurs).

2. In 2007, I vow to finally learn to pronounce the word "raconteurs".

3. In 2007, I vow not to hate more bands but to intensify the anger over the bands I already hate (quality over quantity).

4. In 2007, I vow to find someone who can tell me if those recent Captain Beefheart reissues are worth buying if one already owns them as cheapo imports from 15 years ago (how many times do I have to re-purchase these things, anyway?)

5. In 2007, I vow to take TV On The Radio, grind them down into a fine microscopic dust, and have that dust analyzed by the world's top scientists as a means to figure out why everyone goes so fucking ga-ga over them, 'cuz dude, once I know the answer, I am so going to put that dust in my morning fruit shake and drink it.

6. In 2007, I vow to always surround the name Beck with the words Idiot Scientologist (as in, "The latest album by Beck, Idiot Scientologist, is a dull rehash of the lame white boy street funk schtick he's been shitting out for the last several years; or, It would be a shame if Idiot Scientologist Beck were to wake up one morning and realize his dumb-ass bad-sci-fi-novel religion has been a complete waste of time from the minute he was brainwashed into accepting it".)

7. Most of all, 2007 is the year I vow to download the billions and billions of albums this Napster-as-pig-face guy is offering at his website, despite the complicated subversive tactics which have been erected to avoid detection by the Filesharing Police. Just looking at the exhaustive list of everything he's got for the taking, I can tell 2007 is going to be a long year.

Xenu, Save Me From This Wall Of Fire!

When someone is the sole survivor of, say, a crowded fiery building and claims that God was looking out for them that fateful day, what they're really saying is, at that particular moment, The Almighty Huzzah wasn't so interested in saving anyone else's life and, therefore, abandoned the unfortunate others to their pyro-infested passing. In other words, God knows I'm really good at praying. I imagine this is what Beck thought when he channeled L. Ron Hubbard before embarking on his new album The Information, thus giving him the power to smite his enemies on the Billboard Top 100. But will he be able to keep that pace on the charts with such boring trifle as We Dance Alone and Cellphone's Dead?

Thank you, but I'll stick to the fuzzy funky shoulda-been-hits of Itavayla (Children Of Tomorrow and Hyperborea, in particular), which effortlessly reach their magnificence by keeping their groove to the grindstone. I'd like to say they're better songwriters but it might just be they're more, I don't know, blessed.