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ntwicm next generation 2 (mix)
 

Rounders
 

Dune
 

"Playing in a rokkenroll band while sitting down is like having sex with socks on: what you're doing feels really good, but there's just something slightly amiss which makes you feel a bit self-conscious."

All I know right now is the universe of indie music is infinite. I've been a judge in the Association for Independent Music (AFIM) awards for about four years now, and it's always an excellent opportunity to wallow in a cornucopia of CDs, all sent to me, me, me. I usually find a few hidden gems, since I'm the kind of judge who insists on actually listening to each CD, or most of each CD, before rendering it into one of three piles: Potential Retention, Maybe Good, Crapola. Last year I remember getting the new Rick Springfield album and after a few chuckles of memory (both collective: Jesse's Girl! Noah Drake on General Hospital! And specific: I got a present for giving blood for a blood test when I was about 13 and I could pick any album in the store; I chose Success Hasn't Spoiled Me Yet) I popped it on, and darned if the single "Shock To My System" (which I kept hearing as "you are a shark, shark to my system") isn't on a mix tape as we speak, and the CD nestled in the collection with several hundred of its buddies. 

This year, the crop's looking pretty good. I've got about another 20 CDs to go through right now (Glenn Tilbrook's (ex-Squeeze) The Incomplete Glenn Tilbrook is in the player now. As per usual, he's both pop, pretty, and bland) but the Potential Retention list goes like this thus far (by the way, a PR CD is a guaranteed vote in the competition, at least, unless I have too many once I'm done making piles):

Luce, Self-Titled record (side note: their song "Good Day" was definitely recently used in a commercial, because I recognized the chorus. I'm both pleased that I don't remember the commercial but remember the song and disturbed that I've been self-informed – me, a music critic! – by the ad industry. I think we need a word for a song you hear and like first on an ad, then later on a CD. Um. I'll work on this)
Everything, People Are Moving
Dickey Betts Band, Let's Get Together (side note: I don't necessarily like all of the music, but I've gotten to a point in my life where I can recognize the good without personally being entertained by it; this one's a Potential Retention To Pass On To Mom's Husband, Larry, Who Likes This Stuff)
Tim Easton, The Truth About Us
Randall Bramblett, No More Mr. Lucky

What amazes me is the PR pile is the larger of the three at this point. Glenn has just been dumped into the Crapola pile; he's pretty much slid into hackdom. It's like Squeeze was the best he could muster, and it was darned good, and then he's just been wallowing in the mid-range of indiedom since. Nothing horrible like you'd have to turn it off to keep your sanity, but nothing memorable. Lloyd Cole has replaced him. LC is a guy I recognize as an artist, and a talented one, but who has never exactly been the jumper cables on the dead battery of my heart. So he'll probably go into the PR pile because he's good, but he'll also end up in the big stack I take to the used CD store for re-sale. Some day, when I'm interested in exploring morality, I'll go into the used CD store I visit on a semi-regular basis. In the meantime, I'll just sit back and reflect on the fact that I'm still selling CDs to used record stores, 14 years after starting this whole thing of freelance writing. I can always use the cash. I think we all can, no matter how much we end up making. Once upon a time it was food money; now it's a nice bonus, but it goes to prove that a person's lifestyle really does expand with income.

Speaking of income, how's this for a story I'm not going to lose sleep over: Ken Lay's wife, Linda (and what a name – Linda Lay is even more pornstar than Randee Dawn) is claiming they've "lost everything" – just like the lower-ranking Enron saps whose 401Ks are now for shit. I watched her this morning on the Today show (which I do keep on while working out; NPR is the better station but staring at a radio for a half hour doesn't keep my mind occupied; staring at stupid half-baked news stories apparently fits fine) and she says things like, "The only thing I know, 100 percent for sure, is that my husband is an honest, decent, moral human  being who would do absolutely nothing wrong."

Well, here's how I see it: If he knew, he's a crook. If he didn't know, he's an idiot. "Oh, I was running the company but I had no idea it was all going to shit under my feet." Either way, Ken Lay as whipping boy works just fine for me. Then Mrs. "Stand By Your Man" Lay continued: "Everything we had mostly was in the one stock. Other than the home we live in, everything else is for sale...We are fighting for liquidity. We don't want to go bankrupt.''

Why don't I believe that?

Back to music a moment. I have stumbled on a new journal I really am enjoying -- and remain shocked to my core that the author is a student (in high school! It gives me hope for the future). Here's Hannah, the enraged cat. She's in a very short time turned me on to a guy named Franklin Bruno, and his short little musical meditations. Bruno looks like a cross between my friend Rebecca's husband and George Costanza, but he's got a way with the tune. I've only heard the one, and here I gush. So. More on that as things develop. 

In other music news, one of the members of the Ivy list I run is coming out to NYC to drink in the atmosphere, and wants to meet up. Her name's Cameron, and she has a very flamboyant manner in her emails, and a friend from the list and myself were arguing over the gender of this individual for some time. Now we know the truth. But I figured it had to be a gay man. Shows what I know. I'm sure she'll make an evening out with drinks very, very fascinating.

Me, I think I prefer an infinite universe.