Wednesday shuffle: Sing the song don't be long / Thrill me to the marrow

A man's got to get his workout on. Treadmill shuffle, go!

1. Up The Dosage 2:40 Paul Weller
2. Hollow Cheek 0:32 Guided By Voices
3. Run For Your Life 2:19 The Beatles*
4. American Gangster Time 3:47 Elvis Costello & The Imposters
5. All Night Stand 2:05 The Thoughts
6. Suite: Judy Blue Eyes 7:25 Crosby, Stills & Nash**
7. You Came Through 2:48 PJ Harvey
8. That Is All 3:51 George Harrison
9. Good Morning 5:01 The Dandy Warhols***

* And of course, it was 30 years ago today, John. Hard to believe he's been dead for a good 3/4 of my lifetime. RIP.
** I wouldn't imagine a rather goofy hippy-harmony song like this would be good on the treadmill but to my embarrassment I found myself getting quite into it -- who knew CSN could be workout music?
*** They may be swept up in a kind of hipster backlash in a lot of parts but I still dig these guys, and this slow-burning, bombastic stoner-rock churn of a tune is a fantastic cooldown song.

Sunday shuffle: Much better than the owner of a broken heart

Ah, glorious new iPod! Yes, I remember the days of yore when I bought my 30GB first iPod back in 2005, and I thought, I will never fill this with music, that's a lot of space. Of course it's been pretty much full for the better part of a year or two now and I kept having to delete stuff to put new stuff on, so being a mechanical modern man I decided to splash on a late birthday/early Christmas present of a stylish 120gb iPod with four times the space. Ah, gigabytes, is there nothing they can't do?

1. Poison Cup 2:45 M. Ward
2. Holy Holy 2:23 David Bowie
3. Slip Inside This House 8:03 13th Floor Elevators
4. Burnin' Up 3:52 Ciccone Youth (Sonic Youth)
5. In My Room 3:54 Yaz
6. Born In Time 4:13 Bob Dylan
7. You Belong To My Heart 3:05 Old 97's
8. Don't Ask Me 3:45 Public Image Ltd.
9. Dinner Bells 7:35 Wolf Parade
10. Thrift Store Chair 2:09 Everclear
11. Owner Of A Lonely Heart 4:29 Yes
12. Family Entertainment 2:38 The Undertones
13. Ye Auld Triangle 4:25 Cat Power
14. Whistle For The Choir 3:36 The Fratellis

Wednesday shuffle: Animals they strike curious poses

So anyway, I've been trying to be a bit better about the exercise -- my tricky work schedule and caring for the boy in the afternoons make it tough to get my favorite exercise, walking, in. But the other day I jogged/walked around a local lake and was feeling very pleased at the manly exercising.

Then I realized somewhere along the way my driver's license, that I'd slipped in my shorts, had fallen out. I then had to walk around the basin AGAIN to find my license. Which I finally found on the ground in the parking lot near my car.

Stupid exercise.

1. Pop Juice 4:23 Gomez
2. Interlude: Couldn't Call It Unexpected No. 2 0:22 Elvis Costello*
3. Serve Yourself 3:49 John Lennon
4. Now My Heart Is Full 4:09 Morrissey
5. Nothing Is Good Enough (Instrumental) 3:10 Aimee Mann
6. Electric Feel 3:50 MGMT
7. Racing Like A Pro 3:26 The National
8. Sunday Bloody Sunday 1:37 Richard Cheese**
9. Let's Call It Off 3:39 Peter Bjorn & John
10. Innocent Bones 3:43 Iron & Wine
11. Attack El Robot! Attack! 3:17 Calexico***
12. Love Comes Quickly 4:18 Pet Shop Boys
13. When Doves Cry 3:48 Prince ****
14. Jungle Rock 2:35 The Replacements *****

* For some reason I've always loved this jazzy little pause on one of Costello's most underrated albums, 1991's eclectic as heck "Mighty Like A Rose."
** Nothing better than U2 done in a mambo fashion.
*** Any song with "Robot" in the title is automatically 1000% better.
**** Some things cannot be argued. That this is a Perfect Song is one of them.
***** Raucous live Replacements, which reminds me, one of my holy grails is laying my hands on a copy of the legendary sloppy live Mats set "The Sh*t Hits The Fans." Anybody? Anybody?

Wednesday shuffle: We're gonna have a TV party tonight / all right!

One of the things I quite like about New Zealand spring is the asparagus. Asparagus is awesome, contrary to what I might have thought about it in my youth.

One of the things I dislike is that the weather can often be, to quote Crowded House quite appropriately, "four seasons in one day." Sunny morning, gale-force winds afternoon, rainstorm followed by sunshine. Repeat until summer.

1. Alone (Shakin' Sugar) (demo) 3:16 Wilco
2. Like It Or Not 4:59 Genesis
3. Kiss The Bride 4:23 Elton John
4. TV Party 3:31 Black Flag *
5. In The Mouth A Desert 3:52 Pavement
6. The Grey Estates 3:26 Wolf Parade
7. Things You Can Do 5:26 TV On The Radio
8. 40 Flights Up 5:12 SJD **
9. Heresy 3:54 Nine Inch Nails
10. Automatic Man 1:39 Bad Religion
11. Aurora Borealis 2:45 Meat Puppets ***

* Going from the frothy glossy mid-'80s pop of Elton John to the stark punk of Henry Rollins in one shuffle is guaranteed to induce whiplash.
** A very fine song from a really good Kiwi electro-pop musician.
*** I have always thought "Meat Puppets" is one of the 10 finest band names in existence. In fact I long ago vowed that if I ever formed my own band, I would call it "Sperm Bandits" in a kind of sideways homage. The only thing stopping me is my complete lack of musical or singing talent.

Friday shuffle: In my dang a ding a ding a ding dong

...Is it the weekend yet?

1. Jesus Built My Hotrod 4:53 Ministry
2. Sitting On Top Of The World 2:35 Howlin' Wolf
3. Sabolan 3:59 Ba Cissoko
4. Let's Go 3:34 The Cars
5. Ten Percenter 3:30 Frank Black
6. What We All Want [Live] 5:25 Gang Of Four
7. Juicebox 3:18 The Strokes
8. Nashville Skyline Rag 3:15 Bob Dylan
9. Miss Williams' Guitar 3:09 The Jayhawks
10. Avenues 2:31 Whiskeytown
11. Respectable 3:08 The Rolling Stones
12. Spirits Drifting 2:37 Brian Eno

Wednesday shuffle: What would you say if I sang out of tune?

As spring starts to rear its head distantly over the horizon, and it's a hair less dark, damp and cold than it's been in the mornings, I'm attempting to get back on the horse with walking to work a few times a week. My early work start doesn't mesh very well with trying to walk the 3km all the time, but darn it, I'm going to keep on trudging through the dark til Daylight Savings Time starts again, with only my iPod for company....

1. Nobody's Baby Now 3:54 Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
2. Skinny Love 3:53 Bon Iver*
3. Dead Set On Destruction 3:02 Hüsker Dü
4. Tonight, Tonight 4:28 Genesis**
5. This Room Is Wrong 3:22 Tall Dwarfs
6. I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor 2:54 Arctic Monkeys ***
7. With A Little Help From My Friends 2:44 The Beatles
8. The Boy Done Wrong Again 4:18 Belle & Sebastian

* I should listen to more by this guy.
** Phil Collins fetish, continued.
*** Listen to this at 6:18 AM and I guarantee you won't need any coffee the rest of the morning.
**** On the other hand, while it's a lovely tune, hearing Belle and Sebastian sigh about "All I wanted to do was sing the saddest song" is a sure-fire buzzkill as you trudge, unwilling, through the breaking dawn and into the dim, distant day.

Sunday shuffle: Long time ago when we was fab

Sunday morning newspaper-readin' music while waiting for my parents to ring us on Skype from sunny California...

1. Alright 3:13 Electric Light Orchestra*
2. Godless 5:20 The Dandy Warhols
3. Rocket From A Bottle 3:30 XTC**
4. I Wish It Would Rain Down 5:29 Phil Collins***
5. Quiet Houses 3:32 Fleet Foxes
6. Beat Connection 8:07 LCD Soundsystem
7. When We Was Fab 3:57 George Harrison****
8. You Only Live Once 3:09 The Strokes
9. No Son Of Mine 5:46 Genesis*****
10. The Day The World Turned Day-Glo 2:52 X-Ray Spex ******
11. Loud Love 4:57 Soundgarden
12. Chills 3:50 Peter Bjorn & John

* No, no, Jeff Lynne, it's "all right," not "alright." This really bothers me.
** From XTC's ecstatic spaz-pop stage. Music for spasming to!
*** I maintain Phil Collins '80s work as a serious guilty pleasure. I'm not a big Eric Clapton fan, really, but his guitar solos in this tune are straight-up groovy.
**** I love this tune, one of the best evocations of the Beatles era by one who lived through it. Gentle and appreciative nostalgia.
***** What the heck, is it Phil Collins Sunday on my iPod? This song, not quite as good as the "Easy Lover" era Phil - in fact, this is probably a good turning point where Phil started becoming overly mawkish and sentimental as a writer. It's not a terrible tune, but the early 1990s mark a demarcation between "fun" Phil and "serious social issues and lots of lame Disney soundtrack tunes" Phil.
*****I don't think there's a better song title, anywhere, ever.

Friday shuffle: You gotta call me man, I'll be the biggest fan you'll ever lose

Three mildly vexing things about living in Auckland:

1. I liked the cows on Mount Eden. I shall miss them. Something charmingly Kiwi about climbing the city's highest point and looking down at the skyscrapers while being surrounded by bovines.

2. One of the things about Auckland that is disappointing is the bungled potential of its waterfront, which fails to truly show off its marvelous environment like, say, San Francisco or Sydney. Lots of locals carp about our cluttered downtown, which has some fine old buildings and an awful lot of bland gray boxes and too many ghastly apartment buildings that are an abomination against nature. And the waterfront, which is shamefully cut off from pedestrians by ugly shipping cranes and huge fences. Hopefully, this might be changing, eventually, but it's a shame Auckland's space has been allowed to just develop willy-nilly rather than planned with a sense of, well, feng shui for lack of a better term. Not to fire up the NZ-Aussie rivalry too much, but Sydney manages to incorporate its waterfront into a fine touristy open waterfront, while much of ours is off limits. A shame.

3. For a country that's not really tropical and whose nearest neighbour south is Antarctica, boy do we have a lousy standard of home insulation. Our home gets lots of sun which is great, but the insulation is nearly nonexistent which can be chilly and extraordinarily expensive to add. And central heating? In New Zealand? Don't make me laugh!

Brr. Can you tell it's been freezing lately here in the South Seas? Music warm. Put iPod on and hide under blankets until September or so.

1. Stan [Live] 6:20 Eminem Feat. Elton John*
2. Temptation Inside Your Heart 2:33 The Velvet Underground
3. Date With The Night 2:35 Yeah Yeah Yeahs
4. Bust A Move 1:57 Richard Cheese**
5. I Want Candy 2:35 The Strangeloves
6. Butterfly 3:23 Screaming Trees***
7. I Can't Make It On Time 2:33 The Ramones
8. Magic Toy Missing 1:22 Meat Puppets
9. Nehalem 1:54 Everclear
10. Crackity Jones 1:24 Pixies
11. Teardrop 5:28 Massive Attack
12. The Ways Of Love 4:29 Neil Young
13. How To Fight Loneliness 3:53 Wilco
14. Come Crash 3:03 A.C. Newman

* Have to admit I prefer the album version with Dido. Eminem and Elton John just sound weird together, man.
** Richard Cheese is the best lounge act cover singer of rock and rap tunes you will ever hear. A small niche, admittedly, but still...
*** Screaming Trees remain one of the great underrated grunge bands, I think, IMHO more interesting than say Alice In Chains or Soundgarden even.

Wednesday Shuffle: Superman never made any money / saving the world from Solomon Grundy

Shuffling the iPod while waiting for the car to get its Warrant of Fitness....

The Warrant of Fitness is one of the more annoying revenue grabs in New Zealand. Basically, it requires you to get your car inspected by a mechanic once a year, and they tell you if anything's wrong with it and if it meets Government standards for $50 a pop. More insidious is that if your car is more than 6 years old, like most of us regular folks, you have to get it done every 6 bloody months. $50 just to be told your car works or not. Not even counting any repairs you have to do to pass the Warrant if your car is deemed unsatisfactory. Really, once a year would be enough for any car. The 6 months thing strikes me as a huge money bucket for the Government to feed from.

...Can you tell I just got told I need to spend $400 to fix an oil leak on our slowly crumbling 13-year-old Subaru?

Sigh.

1. Up On Cripple Creek 4:32 The Band
2. Sneaky Feelings 2:12 Elvis Costello
3. Unsatisfied 4:02 The Replacements*
4. Would? 3:29 Alice In Chains**
5. Sweet Illusions 5:02 Ryan Adams & The Cardinals
6. Given To Fly 4:01 Pearl Jam**
7. Humming 6:04 Portishead
8. Hasten Down The Wind 3:00 Warren Zevon
9. Sunflowers 3:48 Everclear
10. Hands All Over 6:02 Soundgarden**
11. I Am Trying To Break Your Heart (Live) 5:22 Wilco
12. Chesley's Little Wrists 1:16 Pavement
13. Superman's Song 4:32 Crash Test Dummies***

* If forced to take one Replacements song and one only on a desert island, I would be hard pressed to choose between this one and "Within Your Reach." But I think "Unsatisfied" would win the day.
** The iPod was in a very grunge mood today.
*** Rather unfairly-deemed 1990s one-hit wonders, the Dummies crafted what I think is one of my all-time favorite songs about a superhero -- brooding, wistful, generously sad and awe-struck at the same time. A real gem.

Tuesday shuffle: Remember me to one who lives there

1. Beat The Clock 3:49 Sparks
2. Girl From The North Country 3:44 Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash*
3. Like A Prayer 5:52 Madonna **
4. Brushed 3:33 Paul Weller
5. I Keep A Close Watch 3:30 John Cale
6. Falling Through Your Clothes 2:54 The New Pornographers
7. Praying Hands 2:48 Devo
8. Jump They Say 3:55 David Bowie ***

* I know it's not considered one of Dylan's "top" efforts but the album this comes from, Nashville Skyline, is probably in my personal top five. Dylan just sounds so warm and comfortable, and it's a casual yet addictive sort of ode to the joys of hearth and home.
** Hey, remember when Madonna was still considered edgy and not some crazy African-baby stealing exercise nut?
*** A sorely underrated Bowie tune, and one of the very few to deal explicitly with his personal life (specifically, his mentally ill half-brother's suicide).

Friday shuffle: Your mom busted in and said what's that noise?

Waiting until it's a suitable time to be ordering Friday night fish'n'chips and making a giant fort of cushions, blankets and assorted paraphernalia/cat trap. It's all for the boy, honest. Because fish'n'chips takeaways instead of McDonald's may not be particularly better for you from a health standpoint, but good god they're yummy in small doses and one of the nice things of being in the commonwealth.

1. Who Are You (Single Edit Version) 4:59 The Who*
2. Ungudi Wele Wele 8:29 Konono Nº1
3. P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing) 3:59 Michael Jackson**
4. My Little Corner Of The World 2:25 Yo La Tengo
5. Helpless 3:33 Neil Young
6. This Poison 4:21 Magazine
7. Confusion 3:42 Electric Light Orchestra
8. Man, It's So Loud In Here 4:03 They Might Be Giants
9. Your Genius Hands 2:45 Everclear
10. Activa 1:49 Deerhunter***
11. Christmas Time Will Soon Be Over 3:17 Jack White
12. 16 Days 3:54 Whiskeytown
13. Fight For Your Right 2:07 Richard Cheese****
14. He Doesn't Know Why 3:20 Fleet Foxes
15. Open Arms 3:19 Journey*****

* I could be seeing The Who (or rather, Townshend and Daltrey and side men) tomorrow night in Auckland, but just too danged expensive and I don't really like stadium shows. Judging from the huge amount of ads I've seen hawking tickets for the show the last couple days, a lot of other people feeling the same way. Still, kinda wondering if it'd be worth the $200 just to see Pete do that 'windmill' thing one time...
** What is up with the demented "Mickey Mouse" voice interlude in this record? Who thought that was a good idea?
*** Very good space-rock band that put out one of last year's more enjoyable discs.
**** Fish'n'chips are one of life's joys. Richard Cheese's demented lounge-rock parodies are another.
***** Never apologize for Journey.

Friday Shuffle: Always singing the same old song / same old song

Rain rain all the live long day. It's an Auckland summer again.

1. Failure 2:54 The La's*
2. Chesley's Little Wrists 1:16 Pavement
3. Rise 6:18 Public Image Ltd.
4. Violet Eyes 3:51 Meat Puppets
5. Tribulations (Lindstrom Mix) 7:56 LCD Soundsystem
6. Making Time 2:55 Creation**
7. Mercy Street 6:23 Peter Gabriel***
8. No Love Lost 3:40 LCD Soundsystem

* The one-album wonder band who did Oasis's schtick better than Oasis ever did I think.
** Aka "The Max Fischer Theme Song."
*** Oddly enough, perhaps my least-favorite track on one of my all-time favorite records. Still a decent if mournful tune though.

Un-Thanksgiving Shuffle: Yes no maybe, I don't know, can you repeat the question?

...So when the international news at work is all blood and chaos, I guess it's kind of weird of me to find today's most life-affirming story to be yet another death. But that's curiously how I felt about seeing today on Reuters the passing of the titleholder for oldest person in the world, Edna Parker, at age 115. Walking home from work listening to the ol' iPod, I thought a bit about Mrs Parker, who was born in the holy-god-long-ago year of 1893 and nearly made it to 2009. Born when Grover Cleveland was president, died with President-elect Barack Obama. It's cliche, I know, but man, what a span of years to have lived through, from the 19th century to now, when pretty much everything around you has changed in the course of living.

To put it in perspective, when the oldest song on today's shuffle, Elvis Presley's "I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine,"** came out in 1954, Edna Parker was already 54 years old and not even halfway through her life. Is it life-affirming, in a way, that someone dies at 115, makes it through the craziness of world wars, nuclear threat, religious fanatics, cable TV and the Internet in one lifetime? I dunno, but when people are blowing each other up for no apparent reason, I guess just staying around for so very long can sometimes seem a bit of a miracle. Supercentenarians fascinate me a bit, as they do most people.

Frankly, some days 37 seems an awful long time to be alive, really!

1. Run Run Run 4:23 The Velvet Underground
2. He War 3:30 Cat Power
3. Minimum Wage 0:46 They Might Be Giants*
4. It's Just Too Much (Live) 3:02 The Velvet Underground
5. I Don't Care If The Sun Don't Shine 2:31 Elvis Presley**
6. Free 3:33 Cat Power
7. Woven Birds 3:47 Calexico
8. Smash It Up (Part 2) 2:56 The Damned
9. Boss Of Me (Theme From Malcolm In The Middle) 2:59 They Might Be Giants***

* The best 46-second song I've ever heard. With bullwhip!
*** Sometimes I'm curious about the arcane algorithms that go into determining what happens when you press "Shuffle." For instance, why, today, out of 6,500 songs on my nearly full iPod, should I get two random songs each today from the Velvet Underground, Cat Power and They Might Be Giants? The shuffle mystery. Ask Edna Parker if she knows now.

Thursday shuffle: Too much monkey business for me to be involved in

...So here's the thing, I thought as I was walking across town to the mechanic to pick up the car --- do you think Sarah Palin doesn't realize she lost the election, and that a large majority of voters and pundits would have to say McCain's choice of her was a big part of the reason for that? Watching her suddenly give more interviews than she somehow managed to do while she was running for vice-president, I had to wonder. Suddenly she's getting more press than President-elect Obama, which doesn't quite seem right. Can we just put a moratorium on 2012 race stories until, I dunno, 2010 at least?? And a moratorium on Sarah Palin, for, like, ever?

1. Here For You 4:32 Neil Young
2. Too Much Monkey Business 2:57 Chuck Berry
3. Gamma Ray 2:57 Beck
4. I Want You To Want Me 3:21 Chris Isaak
5. Come What May 4:46 Nicole Kidman & Ewan McGregor, Moulin Rouge soundtrack
6. Would If I Could 3:40 Melissa Auf der Maur
7. Here (Peel Session) 3:49 Pavement
8. Happy Jack 2:12 The Who
9. Victim Of Love 3:38 Erasure
10. Heart In a Cage 3:28 The Strokes
11. FM 1:46 The Mountain Goats
12. King Horse 3:01 Elvis Costello & The Attractions

Tuesday shuffle: I heard Papa tell Mama, Let that boy boogie woogie

...It's the kind of weather where it's cold in the morning but in the afternoon hot and sticky and you're walking home carrying the leather jacket you wore to work this morning and sweating. And your shoes hurt.

I didn't mean to hit the shuffle button twice -- actual content soon, I swear, just been a busy week.

1. Sound And Vision 3:04 David Bowie
2. Lullaby 2:03 Liam Finn*
3. The Taxi 2:07 Young Marble Giants
4. Evolution 4:46 Cat Power
5. One Love 3:36 The Stone Roses
6. Black Dog 2:34 Blue Mountain**
7. Boogie Chillen 3:12 John Lee Hooker***
8. Back In The U.S.S.R. 1:54 The Beatles****
9. Firestarter 4:43 The Prodigy

* Son of the great Neil Finn, of course.
** Great old Mississippi band and friends of mine wouldjabelieveit, and one of their best songs, a right ol' Southern barnburner.
*** Every time I hear this tune, I grin. Can't help it.
**** When I was 12 or 13, another kid tried to convince me this song proved the Beatles were "communists." The 1980s were an interesting time.

Friday shuffle: Holy muscle of love

...Walking to work on a nice sunny morning and then it begins to rain on you. Welcome to New Zealand, mate!

1. Defy You 3:49 The Offspring
2. Rael 1 5:45 The Who
3. Just Lose It 4:09 Eminem
4. Odditty 2:34 The Clean*
5. She's A Rainbow 4:13 The Rolling Stones
6. Muscle Of Love 3:46 Alice Cooper
7. The Passenger 4:43 Iggy Pop
8. An Unmarketed Product 1:08 Guided By Voices

*A very excellent New Zealand band. Fans of Pavement, check them out.
** I listened to about half this song not knowing who it was. From the Stones' wistful hippies phase I think.
*** The best song title ever. Biggest regret in life: When I interviewed Alice Cooper a couple years back, I didn't ask him about "Muscle of Love."
**** Which is better -- wild rabid dog Iggy or moody mystic Iggy? I can't decide.

Sunday Shuffle: It takes a backwash man to sing a backwash song

...Lazy spring day off, hack hack recovering from mild cold, bonding with the boy, reading Rik Mayall's very amusing "The Rik Mayall: Bigger Than Hitler, Better Than Christ" (if you're a comedian going to write an autobiography, this is the way to do it), and getting ready for a two-day business trip over to Bay of Plenty tomorrow. And music. Cha cha cha cha.

1. Letter To Bowie Knife 3:06 Calexico*
2. December 3:03 Teenage Fanclub
3. Take The Bitter With The Sweet 3:09 Muddy Waters
4. Nobody But Me 2:17 The Human Beinz**
5. We Were Born The Mutants Again With Leafling 4:58 Of Montreal
6. Think I'm In Love 3:19 Beck
7. Chemical Smile 1:50 Everclear
8. In Your Eyes 5:28 Peter Gabriel***
9. Either/Or 2:27 Elliott Smith
10. Slowdive (XFM Session) 4:10 LCD Soundsystem
11. Hotwax 3:49 Beck****

* While I like this tune it doesn't sound a thing like the spacey southwest doom-rock they usually do, it's like they're channeling '60s britpop or something.
** A great old rocker, how annoying it is that when I hear it it brings to mind TV commercials.
***I went through a total obsessive P.G. phase back in the '90s and with this song in particular (yes, there was a girl involved). Thus, I think I've listened to this song more than any other in memory. Yikes.
****I have rather inexplicable flashbacks of driving around Memphis, Tennessee, looking for sushi when I hear this song.

Sunday Shuffle: You're Playin' With Your Life, This Ain't No Truth Or Dare

...The soundtrack for making pizza for lunch with our friend Denis. And the first truly sunny warm day in eons that falls on a weekend, hurray!

1. Not Home Anymore 5:59 Whiskeytown*
2. Department Of Youth 3:18 Alice Cooper
3. I Got You (I Feel Good) 2:47 James Brown
4. Science Fiction, Double Feature 3.00 Various Artists The Rocky Horror Picture Show Soundtrack**
5. Wanderlust 3:04 R.E.M.
6. Chain Of Command 2:34 XTC***
7. I Can't Make It On Time 2:33 The Ramones****
8. Oh Sherrie 3:51 Steve Perry *****
9. A Sentence of Sorts in Kongsvinger 4:56 Of Montreal
10. Breath 5:28 Pearl Jam
11. Love Is The Foundation 2:32 Loretta Lynn
12. Everybody's Happy Nowadays 3:12 The Buzzcocks
13. San Francisco Days 3:00 Chris Isaak
14. Start To Move 1:13 Wire
15. My Baby Just Cares For Me 3:04 Nina Simone
16. Beat It 4:18 Michael Jackson******

*From the extraordinarily good new 2-CD Stranger's Almanac Special Edition. Ryan Adams hasn't released a new album in like, what, 6 months. He must be dead.
**I haven't seen this movie in years but I'm kind of afraid to as it's likely to be far cheesier and more dated than I remember.
***For some reason the chaotic strut of early XTC always sounds to me like a marching band on speed.
****I still miss Joey Ramone.
*****In 1987 I had a crush on a girl named Sherry and thus this was the finest song of all times. Don't look at me like that.
******Honestly, this one song still almost makes the last 25 years of horror and comedy for its singer seem worthwhile.

Friday Shuffle: 'I was a landscape in your dream and all my mountains were on fire.'

...The iPod was in a melancholy mood today but after wallowing in navel-gazing electronica soon roused itself with some Lennon rabble-rousing. It smelled like cut grass and gray storm clouds.

1. My Seventh Rib (Live) 2:29 The Shins
Circus apology
2. I Was A Landscape In Your Dream 3:05 Of Montreal
Lost reverie
3. Obstacle 2 3:47 Interpol
Stern angst
4. Hurt 6:14 Nine Inch Nails
Hushed explosions
5. Rainbow 8:11 Battles
Calculators dancing
6. Power To The People 3:20 John Lennon
Crowd control
7. Boulevard Of Broken Dreams 4:21 Green Day
Sidewalk anthem