Friday, November 20, 2009 We are creeping, quite quickly actually in to the looming holiday season and the studios are sort of coughing up the small game in lieu of the enormous money makers to come. Of course, this is the weekend of Twilight, so perhaps I'm just talking out of my ass, but this feels like the calm before the storm. An animated flick from the creators of Shrek, a slightly chintzy looking sports flick, and of course Bela and Edward - consider me non-plussed. It's the limited films I'm interested in this [...]
My very good friend Randy Fuller has a really cool blog that is not about rock and roll. It's about wine, but he wrote an excellent piece recently on rock and roll wines. Actually, it's about good wine in bottles with rock and roll labels - Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon is there, so are the Rolling Stones, and even a Woodstock poster bottle. As I said, very cool, and you can read it here . I've known Randy for many years now, we went [...]
I wrote this post over a year ago - in August 2008, to be exact - after I got a cease and desist for posting a song by a girl named Gabriella Cilmi. For whatever reason, I didn't post this. Maybe I figured some mysterious record company man in a long black coat with scars on his face would whack me in the parking lot if I did. Not so worried about that now. And, if you don't mind me noting: as of today - November 20, 2009 - I haven't heard a lot [...]
This has been a week of medical appointments, all follow-ups or scheduled maintenance. I begrudge the time. I know the appointments are necessary to make sure all my parts continue to function, but I hate appointments, the scheduling of time. My day should be leisurely, a chair on the beach with an umbrella drink in my hand sort of day. It is sweat shirt weather: warm, sunny and lovely. Yesterday the two cats, Fern and Maddie, were eleven and today Gracie is four. Lots of special treats for the three of them. I am a pet [...]

In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book. Lydia Millet is one of my favorite writers, and her first collection of short fiction, Love in Infant Monkeys marries celebrities with animals to great effect. These keenly written interactions of human and animal move these tales forward and offer rare insights into the human psyche as well as our celebrity-obsessed culture. The Los Angeles Times wrote of the book: "Lydia Millet's first [...]
Originally released in 1989 on Metal Blade, it's good to have Anvil's kick ass live album back in print. This came out after their minor brush with North American success thanks to the video for "Mad Dog" from the 1987 album Strenth of Steel and right before their decline into obscurity. We all know that Anvil is now bigger than ever thanks to the excellent film Anvil! The Story of Anvil but a lot of people are unaware about how great Anvil was (and still is) as a live band. Recorded at The Waters Club in [...]

The Antiheroines series features author Jami Attenberg interviewing up-and-coming female comics artists. In May I saw Lisa Hanawalt, author of I Want You (Buenaventura Press) and the Ignatz award-winning mini-comic Stay Away From Other People , do a slide show presentation as part of a group show at Hi Christina , a wee venue in Williamsburg. During Lisa's extremely dry but charming performance, she did this short bit about her week. [...]
There's a good chance many of you reading this have not heard of Ghettosocks . That's fine, I mean, after all, that's what we're here for, to try and remedy that situation. But I will says this: if you like classic hip hop (more specifically hip hop & hip hop culture from the early to mid nineties), if you do hear a Ghettosocks album, I'd be willing to bet my leather Africa medallion that you're going to like it. In fact, we should make the Grand Wizard Ghettosocks required listening for any fan of Golden Age [...]
Contrast Podcast recently asked music bloggers like myself to submit our favorite 50 songs of the year for their annual "Festive 503 podcast. Our selections were then compiled into a shortlist and now we've been asked to recruit votes to narrow it down. For the curious, I've bolded the 10 songs I personally voted for. I really, really want "Nice Very Nice" by Kurt Vonnegut & Dave Soldier (from their album Ice-9 Ballads ) to make the final list. Not only because it's my favorite song of the year, from my favorite album of the year, [...]

Matter of Time mp3 The Leisure Society The Sleeper ..... ..... buy it Well, now this is getting interesting... Over at the Contrast Podcast , Tim's solicited everyone for their favorite 50 songs of 2009, remember? From all the responses he's compiled the top 155. I'm very impressed with the list! If you didn't submit your faves yet, you've still got a chance to get in the game at this point! Help us out, eh? (I"ve highlighted my top 10 in blue) Here's [...]
In this day and age, few things come around that make us stir from head to toe with glee and anticipation. One of these things was the announcement of the new rock super ensemble that is Them Crooked Vultures , a tripod of giants with the force of three generations of rock 'n' roll. I'm going to assume a number of people know by now, but all the same, the Vultures are: badass Josh Homme from Queens of the Stone Age on guitar, the Foo Fighters' Dave Grohl going back to his drum set, and none other [...]
As we close in on Miller Time around these parts, here's a round up of a few of the day's top stories that for one reason or another your humble editors considered-but ultimately rejected-for individual posts today. ― Authorities search for robbers who made a Gold Line getaway God bless, The News. Never one to let the small details of the story pass up a good catchy alliterative headline. If you actually read the story, you will see that the crime was a stolen cellphone [...]

I'm not too sure what to make of Sonny Vandevelde when I first meet him for this interview. His salt and pepper beard, bucket hat and affable demeanor makes me think he once worked in a surf shop. The term "salty sea dog" seems particularly apt and I'm not too sure why. Surprisingly that assumption is only half true because (though he loves surfing) Balenciaga, Comme Des Garcons and Alexander McQueen are the only shows to have eluded Vandevelde's lens thus far. Actually it's far easier on my wrists, sanity and time to list the shows he hasn't documented backstage. [...]

La scorsa settimana abbiamo terminato il nostro viaggio attraverso gli album più importanti del decennio che si sta concludendo. Abbiamo quindi pensato di riassumere il tutto in questo post che non è altro che la lista completa, tappa per tappa, degli album che di volta in volta abbiamo approfondito, in modo tale da avere una sorta di indice delle varie puntate. Dopo il salto trovate anche la listona di tutti gli album che di anno in anno sono stati inseriti fra "gli album da salvare". [...]

Alright, this week are mainly songs that will make you dance, dance, dance! And maybe after, you will watch Pulp Fiction. Mmmm Cheeseburger Royale. Enjoy dudes, and watch out! More updates coming, including a mixtape which is pretty much awesome NOT GONNA LIE! -I am seeing PEACHES ANNNNND AMANDA BLANK TOMORROW AT THE MÉTROPOLIS!!! It is going to be so sick. I've waited so long to see her. The day she came to Edmonton, she played at my FAVORITE venue ever, the Starlite Room, but it was also the day before moving out east. So blah. But, her [...]

Time for yet another episode of the 'What Have I been reading'-lists I've been keeping. I use a little booklet for this, and I'm already dreading the day that the book is full. Most of it is written in pencil, so that I could erase it, but maybe I'll just make a 900 pages long notebook myself, in which I meticulously keep listed what I've read in my life. My children, or my parents, my friends will find this list one day, thinking that I spent too much time reading and too little time living. But They don't know that [...]
Welcome to the new, not-really-improved BabyStew This Week In Chicago listing. What's new about it, you ask? Absolutely nothing, except that it now covers the week from Monday through Sunday rather than Sunday through Saturday. It always seemed weird to me not to be listing Sunday shows until the morning of – when not many people are reading blogs – for the sole purpose of sticking with the conventional definition of "week" ( i.e. , Sun-Sat). But convention be damned. So here's what's going on in Chicago this "week". [...]
Memorable Quotes "Another Successful interaction with a man."--Liz Last weekend I picked up this girl after practicing Jedi Moves at Prospect Park. Took her home on the handlebars of my bike, snuck her inside past my mom, she sees my mint condition Hell boy action figure and she starts quoting your damn book."--Frank "I did Big Sister in College. That little girl taught me how to use tampons."--Liz "Punish You? I've always wanted to film a student werewolf movie in Iceland where I'm filling in last minute for Victoria [...]

i grew so tired of movement so one day i stopped. how it happened; picture me as occam's razor. with tits. picture me as emmeline pankhurst. with catheter. how it happened; the opposite of awakening. the sun rises one morning and you don't. there are no more choices only slogans. you lay comfortable with the realisation that there is no freedom only consumption. medicine is an illusion. love is panic. it all fades. clouds lift. doors forced open in [...]

Back in September, I announced the Potentially Annual 2009 DJs Bronwyn and Kelly Xmas Xontest right here p on WFMU's Beware of the Blog because last year DJ Kelly and I had a competition to see who would be the first to hear Christmas Music Played in a Store. I won! November 10, 2008, in the dark and deserted men's department at Lord & Taylor. But now I don't work in Midtown anymore, and I doubt I will ever go to L&T again, so this year we opened the Xontest to All Listeners and solicited [...]