I was wrong.. Jarvis Cocker should be poet laureate!

This is excellent!!! I'm slowly turning into an anglophile.

And now for some USDA Grade-A melodrama ala moi...

I’m on the cold precipice of March, just wavering between the frozen Chaos of winter and the balmy stillness of spring. Tonight I feel agitated, excited, stressed and buzzing with a thousand competing ideas. The neurons and synapses are buzzing with the electricity of deadlines, dreams, exaltations, caffeine and also dread. The dread is invested in the fast-approaching essays and presentations that will come after spring break. Unfortunately many things ride on these tangible demonstrations of academia, and this scares the living hell out of me. The Machine of OCD and its incessant static thrives off the fuel of insurmountable pressure. I always feel like an intruder on the halls of academia—a farce, a clown under intellectual guise. This feeling of inefficacy makes scholarly writing that much harder because I’m constantly grappling with myself.

Ray Davies should be the poet laureate

I love the Kinks, especially Autumn Almanac and Dead end Street. Screw Wordsworth and Colleridge, Mr. Davies is where it's at.


Speaking of Wordsworth... I am SO tired of hearing about him in every class I take. Yes, I realize as an English major that I need to be well versed in his works and those of his contemporaries, but can't we modernize things a little bit? Wordsworth and John Milton are killing me.
How about some Dylan Thomas and James Joyce? What about those awesome Russians Chekov, Tolstoy and Dostoevsky? Samuel Beckett anyone? I won't even ask about the Beat writers because I know that would be too good to be true. Come on Kean, get it together.

"hooray for tuesday!"

I've been playing Elliott Smith's cover of the Minders' song "Hooray for Tuesday" nonstop. It is just that good. This is a great contrast in mood after reading Albert Camus' The Stranger, which was excellent, but really stark and depressing. Anyway, here is the absolute and total happiness that is "Hooray for Tuesday".


















Lastly, Meditate on this! ^ (My preschoolers have various theories concerning that red "glove hat" and the hermeneutics of its existence).

A "Chune" tune

I'm really getting into 1960's british (and american) pop. Back then the word "pop" was not synonymous with homogenized aural shit, it actually signified expert craftsmanship in both songwriting and producing. Thanks to my copious (and obsessive) re-readings of the books written about Elliott Smith, I am finally finding out about the Zombies, The Left Banke and Box Tops. These guys knew how to use harmony and complex instrumentation to their advantage.



Beautiful piece of baroque pop! I totally see where Smith was influenced when it came to chordal structure and lyricism. (disregard the smelly pictures in the video haha)

Alex Chilton= excellence

I cannot believe that he was sixteen when he sang this! I love the terrible lipsynching job in this video... seems intentional!

amazing cover

ballad of el goodo

Alex Chilton is an excellent musician, and I can't believe that I didn't listen to Big Star sooner. Very many kudos to Elliott Smith for referencing Chilton, because I have found a hidden musical gem. I'm bracing myself for yet another snow storm and the copious amounts of shoveling that it entails. Thank ye gods for Stolichnaya, cranberry juice, space heaters and Big Star!