Rilo Kiley---A Better Son, Daughter

Life goes on...

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Beatles---Being For The Benefit Of Mr. Kite

Remember, folks--it wasn't cannabis that killed George Harrison. It was tobacco.

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"State Trooper" Covers

Bruce Springsteen inspires a lot of covers, here's a few versions of "State Trooper" from his monumental Nebraska album.

The Veils:


Jarvis Cocker:


Dustin Kensrue:

Peter, Paul, And Mary---"Leaving On A Jet Plane"

There is something about an airport that can really get you down.

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John Lennon---Nobody Told Me (Strange Days)

This song was released posthumously in 1984,
the last of Lennon's work to reach the Top 10.

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Rilo Kiley---Portions For Foxes

I'm a simple man. A sunny day and this
song never fail to put me in a good mood...

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Simon And Garfunkel---The Sound Of Silence

The sign said the words of the prophets are written on the subway walls and tenement halls...

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It's Only Love

This sounds like a version that didn't make it
onto the album. But if you like the voice of John Lennon...

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Rilo Kiley - Rise Up With Fists (Boston)

Six more days until the show in Orlando.

Rock And Roll Music

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Pink Floyd - The Final Cut

If Bob Dylan is rock music's poet, then Roger Waters is its novelist. A very Orwellian novelist. This is an obscure video for Pink Floyd's "Final Cut", which in my opinion is the finest of their many fine compositions.

Dustin Kensrue - Creep

The main man in the band Thrice plays a mean acoustic in this version of Radiohead's first smash, "Creep".

Please Please Me

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Peter, Paul, and Mary---Lemon Tree

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Actors Discuss The Kingdom

The cast of the upcoming film The Kingdom got together to discuss the controversial project.

Queen Jane Approximately

Great melody, great lyrics, classic Dylan.

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Texas A and M-Kingsville's Institute for Ranch Management Gets F Minus From Graduate Student Teacher Hector Diego

A piece of beef is just some red stuff inside a package,
right?

Texas A&M-Kingsville's Institute for Ranch Management is a retrograde institution in a modern world where eating cows is completely unnecessary and cruel. This redneck outfit has announced that it is now offering Master's degrees in cattle ranch management, a true perversion of education.

The world is, unfortunately, filled with retrograde institutions, which are intertwined to keep you a fool about your eating habits. For instance, if you go to this site you find out that the occupation with the highest rate of suicide tends to be "food batch makers." And you think, so what?

Now go to this site and find out what a food batch maker is. Do you think the highest rates of suicide in these occupations are going to be among candy makers and butter wrappers, or carcass washers and weighers, hoof removers, industrial butcher helpers, neck skewers, hog shavers, stunners, and shacklers? These are the servile automatons who have to smell the animals' fear, blood, and feces as they scream when they are so cruelly slaughtered. It is well-known and intuitive that the second group mentioned above are far likelier to have the highest rates of suicide of all food batch makers, which makes them the occupational standard for suicide against which all other occupations are measured.

Did you know that the stunning business is frequently a farce, so that bovines are shackled (hung upside down) while still conscious and sliced at the throat with a knife while still conscious? They could be killed with one stunning blow, of course, but do you know why this method is not used? IT COSTS HALF A PENNY MORE! And do you really think that the slaughter houses are going to pay that much attention to the efficacy of their stunning devices (a concern that would cost money to the capitalistic assembly line method), or that government inspections would veer away from health concerns to attend to humanitarian ones? Let's remind ourselves, slaughter houses throughout the world do not concern themselves with laws against cruelty, and in many places, there are no such laws.

You don't want to think about any of this, and you don't. That's exactly what Big Brother wants, for you to not think.

Right?

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Melanie, "I Don't Eat Animals"

William Eye---I Got It From My Mama

I know my wife doesn't want me to watch the video, so I'm not even going to try to get away with that. But I'm hoping she will at least respect my first amendment right to play the song...

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The Grass Roots---Let's Live For Today

It doesn't matter how spiritual you get, the present is the only reality.

1967.

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Revolver---She Said, She Said

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Rolling Stones---Lady Jane

The Execution of Lady Jane Grey, Paul Delaroche, 1833.

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Yer Blues

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Jimi Hendrix---All Along The Watchtower

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Coming Soon--Juno

Here's the trailer for the upcoming film Juno. The film won't be out until December, but that's only a limited release.

The cast on this movie is insane. Furthermore, I do believe I heard the great Kimya Dawson in the trailer. That alone would send me to the theater. Anyone making a movie who's that in touch has to be doing a dang fine job.

Here's the trailer.

Cry Baby Cry

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Allied Radio - Game

This is a video I made for my band, Allied Radio. Basically it's about reading the sports section and throwing the rest of the newspaper in the trash.



MP3 Allied Radio - Game
MP3 Allied Radio - Drinking Down April
MP3 Allied Radio - Pills

J. S. Bach---Brandenburg Concerto #1

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685--1750)

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You've Got To Hide Your Love Away

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A Rainy Day In Ireland

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21st Century Interpretation of George Harrison's "Within You Without You"

Did you ever consider that there might be a connection between modern jazz and classical Indian music? Coltrane went to India and was influenced by what he heard. That's all I know about Coltrane so don't ask me to elaborate!

George Harrison's melody stands the test of time, here reworked by Renzo Baltuzzi on electric guitar, Mauro Namías on classical guitar, and Joaquín Moliné on udu, bongo, shakers, and batería.

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Dr. Badarinath---Sitar Raga

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Radhastami 2007

If your God doesn't have a girlfriend like mine does, maybe that's why he is frequently in a bad mood, and mean to people...like sending them to hell forever on the basis of one lifetime only.

Let's think rationally about this.

Mieka Pauley - Run

Mieka Pauley's first new album Elijah Drop Your Gun in 7 years comes out in the fall. We'll keep you posted.

This is a fantastic performance of her signature song, "Run".


MP3 Meika Pauley - Fate Day by Day.
MP3 Meika Pauley - Run.

Rilo Kiley - With Arms Outstretched (Michigan)

The saga continues. From Monday night in Royal Oak, Michigan.

Astrologer Jeffrey Armstrong Shows His Stuff

Astrology debunker Michael Shermer has finally met his match, I would say. Please watch the whole thing. Shermer has not debunked Jeffrey Armstrong. I have never seen a case where an astrologer has achieved such a high percentage of correspondence between horoscopes and known facts.

Just something to think about.

Beatles---A Day In The Life

The Station Agent's post, below, about the Amen beat, or break, got me thinking about drumming and drummers. Ever since the Beatles appeared on the scene I have heard "sophisticated" people disparaging Ringo's drumming, because he is not always technically perfect. You know, you could make the same observations about any of the Beatles--you could find more virtuosity elsewhere. But so what? If that is the way you assess music, you could be best friends with Star Trek's Mr. Spock.

Ringo Starr was a particularly innovative drummer; that's just one reason the Beatles wanted him. I have selected "A Day In The Life" for your aural inspection because the Beatles' producer George Martin felt it was a fine example of Ringo's contribution to the Beatles.

Don't you?

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The Ditty Bops - Walk or Ride

Folksy Los Angeles band The Ditty Bops are fronted by Abby DeWald and Amanda Barrett. Late last year they played an in house gig at studio.ugo.com.



More from The Ditty Bops at The Smudge.

MP3 The Ditty Bops - Skinny Bones. (WNKU)

Music Appreciation--The Evolution of the Amen Break

This is a bit long, but it's interesting. Just listen to the audio, the visuals are not important.

Rilo Kiley---I Never

Jenny Lewis has been called the new Dusty Springfield. On this song, oh yes.

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The New Pornographers - My Rights Versus Yours

Strong performance on David Letterman by the fabulous Canadian band.


MP3 New Pornographers - My Rights Versus Yours (live on KEXP)

Tracy Morgan Wakes Up Chicago

Tired of boring celebrities? Try Tracy Morgan of NBC's hysterically funny 30 Rock stopping by WGN's morning show and infusing a little personality.

Robert Jordan (James Oliver Rigney Jr.) 1948-2007

The great fantasy writer has passed. My condolences to his friends and family, who by all accounts, absolutely adored this man. In this picture, we see Jordan with his beloved wife Harriet at DragonCon 2005.

From Charleston Post and Courier:

Charleston novelist James Oliver Rigney Jr., 58, known to millions of readers by the pen name Robert Jordan, the best-selling author of "The Wheel of Time" fantasy series, died Sunday after a fight with the rare blood disease amyloidosis, a progressive disorder first diagnosed in December 2005 at the Medical University of South Carolina.

Rigney, who also wrote novels under the nom de plume Reagan O'Neal, succumbed to complications from primary amyloidosis with cardiomyopathy.

In an open letter to the science fiction magazine Locus in April of 2006, Rigney said he had been diagnosed with a disorder that affects only eight people out of one million each year.

The most popular fantasy author since J.R.R. Tolkien, Rigney was born in 1948 in Charleston. A graduate of The Citadel who earned a degree in physics, he served two tours of duty in Vietnam with the U.S. Army, winning a Distinguished Flying Cross, the Bronze Star and two Vietnamese Crosses of Gallantry. A lifelong history buff and voracious reader, he also wrote dance and theater criticism. He had been writing full time since 1977.

(more)

I really look forward to seeing his vision completed, but it's hard to think about anything more than this shocking, loss. I knew of his illness, but on his personal blog, he remained defiant of his long odds and he seemed to have the good medical reports to back it up. I read almost every interview and article about him for years. His public persona was among the warmest I've ever observed. He really did touch a great many people.

To whomever the task falls to complete Jordan's monumental Wheel of Time Series, good luck. Jordan left a high standard. Surely the spirit of his work and the infectiousness of his personality will spread to those who take up his work.

VIDEO: RJ flashes a bit of wit at a book signing appearence in 2005.

I'd Rather Eat A Kitten Than A Calf...

The secret is that the rancher is not a real friend.


Do you like the title of my song? It's sung to the tune of "I'd Rather Be A Hammer Than A Nail".

It's because I'm Hindu. I would never, ever eat a kitten, but if the choice were mine the kittens would go into your oven before the calves would. So I guess it would be more accurate for me to say I would rather you eat a kitten instead of a calf. Call me a barbarian.

I'm ranting about stupid cultural practices (such as eating calves) today because I just saw this video on Yahoo News? About an eleven year old boy fighting bulls in Mexico? The fools who made the video had no comment about bullfighting (bull murdering, really), as if it was something the kid should be proud of. It also showed his idiot father sitting there in a suit, proud of his son.

If you are not shocked by my ideas already, you might be now: I'M ON THE BULL'S SIDE! People who "fight" bulls deserve whatever they get. At least they won't be tortured, which is more than could be said for the bull.

Pope Impious V condemned bullfights, not because of respect for the animals, but because too many fools were being killed by them. This just shows the poverty of heart and thought in Western "culture", which Gandhi said "would be a good idea."

At present, most people do not consider the rights of animals at all, relying on the falsehood that "we have to think about the welfare of humans first", as if the two issues were actually connected. They are not. Such ignorance is so ingrained that a gadfly like me has to use shocking language just to get anyone's attention.

At the very least, Hector Diego begs all TWS visitors to let the bull's children live. How would you feel if you were a veal?

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"Paul on "Bungalow Bill" and animal rights: I remember John singing "Bungalow Bill" in Rishikesh. This is another of his great songs and it's one of my favourites to this day because it stands for a lot of what I stand for now. "Did you have to shoot that tiger" is its message. "Aren't you a big guy? Aren't you a brave man?" I think John put it very well. Funny enough, John wasn't an overt animal activist, but I think by writing this song he showed that his sentiments were very much that way. One of the nice things about Beatles songs is that in many cases they do seem to stand the test of time and this is an example of one that's getting better with time. It's becoming more and more relevant. If you look at veal crating and listen to this song, or look at the hunting of nearly extinct species like tigers and rhinos, well, this is a very good song. In that context it's fabulous."

Beach Boys---Surfer Girl

I stood right on this spot overlooking the Pacific just over a month ago, visiting the haunts of my youth. One never wants to leave such a place...

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Rilo Kiley - Breakin' Up

From Friday night in Minnesota. Nice audio for an audience recording.

Beatles---In My Life

The Pondering Pig has used the Beatles to discuss friendship.
It's easy to see why, those four guys were culturally paradigmatic...
counter-culturally, that is.

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John Lennon---The Word

"I'm here to show everybody the light!" No wonder the conservative Christians couldn't get off on John Lennon.

But what difference does it make where you get the message, from Jesus of Nazareth or John of Liverpool? Isn't the message the same--love?

Say the Word.

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." John, 1.1.

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Bob Dylan---Blowin' In The Wind

Dylan's name would have been immortalized by this song alone...

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John Lennon---Love

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Bob Marley---Talkin' Blues

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Here, There, And Everywhere

This song was John's favorite of Paul's compositions.

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Best of Sifl and Olly

This is so 1998 it's ridiculous. "Get to Llama School!"

No Speedy Delivery of New Postal Service Album

Looks like there's not going to be a new Postal Service album any time soon.

Here's a couple of tracks from the supergroup's performance on KCRW in support of their 2003 record.

MP3 Postal Service - Such Great Heights (kcrw).
MP3 Postal Service - Nothing Better (kcrw).

Moody Blues---Dawn Is A Feeling

From Days Of Future Passed, 1967.

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Beatles---Nowhere Man

I believe this song tells us much about Lennon's views on just about everything humans do, including religion. Even Jesus can't help you if you won't help yourself.

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Rilo Kiley - The Moneymaker (Acoustic)

From the End's Beach House in Seattle. Day time shows rule!

Less than three weeks until the gig in Orlando.

Rilo Kiley - With Arms Outstretched (Seattle)

Electrifying performance of the RK song TV producers like the most. From Saturday in Seattle Washington.



MP3 Rilo Kiley - With Arms Outstretched (2/21/03 Good Records, Dallas, TX)

Sean Kingston---Beautiful Girl

Here's another song my daughters are tormenting me with. Sounds like "Stand By Me" to me and about fifty others from the late 50s and early 60s. So why did George Harrison get hit with a lawsuit over My Sweet Lord, and this guy gets away with his copy-cat stuff?

Anyway just play G, E minor, C and D, and back to G, on your little fiddle there, and that's the song.

Good for the fat kid. Is "Beautiful Girl" up there on the charts?

Bruce Springsteen and The E Street Band -- Kitty's Back

I posted this back in February, but it's been in my head all day. I only posted the video:



Today, I have the MP3 for you people. Enjoy one of the world's consummate bands playing a classic very well.

MP3 Bruce Springsteen and The E Street Band -- Kitty's Back.