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{ 2010 01 09 }

A whole big bunch of music, sociology, and more…

Belated happy new year everyone. I’ve had good intentions to blog more often, but all of my writing energy is going toward new songs, editing research papers for publication, and trying to land a letter in Penthouse Forum. Here is a bunch of things I’ve been reading/digging/thinking about over the last month, culled from my Twitter feed. (More on that later — the short version is that I like Twitter far more than I thought I would.) Your thoughts are welcome, as always.

First off, check out Amy’s annual top 10 book list, along with a link to her lists for the past decade. It’s amazing how far and wide this travels every year. This time, she mentioned her love for Martin Sheen — this resulted in an email from someone who works for the Sheen brothers and promises to try to get it to Martin. Very cool.

Music

* I’ve been ripping many old CDs that I didn’t get to when we moved to MP3s nearly six years ago. Somehow, I skipped over all of our Peter Gabriel records, so I’ve had fun getting reacquainted with them. Another fun rediscovery: “Sell Me A God” by Eat, an English band from the late 80s/early 90s. Check out “Tombstone,” their college radio hit. And while you’re in an ’80s college rock (yes, that’s what we called it back then, indie kids), check out Slicing Up Eyeballs, an excellent blog devoted to the subject. They link to things like this kickass video of Midnight Oil playing a protest show at the Exxon building back in 1990 (post-Valdez wreck), U2 ringing in the last decade in Dublin with “Where the Streets Have No Name, and a BBC interview with John Lydon/brief PiL reunion clip.

* Besides that, I’ve been obsessed with tracking down every U2 and Joe Strummer b-side I can find. It’s always amazing when an artist is so good that their non-album tracks are better than most artists’ lead single. I also finally checked out Frank Turner’s “Love, Ire & Song,” at the urging of our friend Tom Krueger. Check out some samples at Amazon — he’s like a cross between Billy Bragg and New Model Army.

* Other music stuff…

  • This is exceptionally cool: videos of Bono & The Edge on Elvis Costello’s Spectacle show. Nice collaborations all around. Speaking of U2, this is a great ten-minute clip from a documentary on Irish rock that discusses the Dublin scene that U2 & Gavin Friday came from. And here’s a good interview with excellent producer Steve Lillywhite.
  • Ted Leo & The Pharmacists’ 2010 tour kicks off in Cleveland on 3/11. You can hear three tracks from the new record here.
  • Jazz fans: check out this cool site at NPR: The Jazz Loft Project: Sights And Sounds.
  • Did you know that Kraftwerk had a big influence on Afrika Bambaataa & Detroit technno? Me neither. NYT: Who Knew That Robots Were Funky?
  • Get five songs from ex-Backslider Chip Robinson’s “Mylow” here. He’s one of Americana’s most underrated songwriters. 
  • Lately, I’ve been working to “Music by Ry Cooder,” a mostly instrumental, two-CD comp. It’s really nice. Amazon link.
  • Great piece from 2005 – Tom Waits on his most cherished albums of all time, from the The Guardian.

Sociological (or “sociology near”)

  • Good Guardian article on Danah Boyd’s (@zephoria) research on youth & digital life: http://j.mp/4tTb34
  • Scott McLemee responds to critics of his strong critique of Cornel West’s latest. Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/6K79dP
  • Is loneliness contagious? More results from the Framingham data in Journal of Personality and Social Psychology – MSNBC http://bit.ly/4WgWZ5
  • Good article on college tuition, revenue/expenses, w/ a chart of where the money goes, by KSU student paper – http://bit.ly/8b71on

Politics/Opinion

  • Christopher Hitchens says we’re terrible at airline security, and not getting better. http://bit.ly/6sXMCy. Here’s an xcellent graphic from FiveThirtyEight: your odds of being a victim of an airborne terrorist attack: http://bit.ly/55FP8x
  • Excellent columns by Paul Krugman on: (1) Senate dysfunction — cites interesting stats on filibusters. http://nyti.ms/85Bl1o, and (2) why we need a WPA-style emergency jobs program. I’ve never understood the downside of this. http://bit.ly/6Lj1ko
  • A prominent conservative blogger parts ways with the right. Good list of reasons why: Little Green Footballs – http://bit.ly/7mEJnC #

Miscellaneous cool stuff

  • Check out our friend Peter Cox’s site: amazing landscape photos of Ireland. We have the calendar, it is stunning. http://bit.ly/4AIbxu
  • Lance Armstrong reflects on the 2009 season, and takes a different approach to the 2010 Tour de France http://bit.ly/91GY7f
  • New LeBron/Kobe puppets commercial. Black Santa, Akron shoutout, and dunking on reindeer. Yes! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JpMZAcmNI7A
  • Brain Pickings is an excellent blog with daily posts of interesting stuff. A few examples (her words, not mine): (1) “Droplets – stunning, stunning series by photographer Matt Holliday  Simplicity, at its most magnificent. (2) 20 things that happen in 1 minute – a fascinating infographic http://is.gd/5A6Jx; (3) Revamped Hubble reveals never-before-seen deep images of the universe’s youngest galaxies http://is.gd/5gjvs; (4) Thin Blue Line – the thin line of Earth’s atmosphere and the setting sun, shot from ISS. Gorgeous. http://is.gd/570q0
  • The excerpts from the new Pluto/Windhorst book on LeBron, “The Making of an MVP,” are worth a read if you’re a hoops fan. This one is another ex of “it takes a village…” http://bit.ly/5BAGkR
Posted by Dave on Saturday, January 9, 2010, at 9:19 am. Filed under Akron, general, music, politics, sociology, sports. Tagged , . Follow any responses to this post with its comments RSS feed. Both comments and trackbacks are currently closed.