The Next World and Welcome to It

This may mean nothing except to those of a certain age, but William Windom has passed. He was the star of one of my favorite 60s sitcoms, My World and Welcome To It. A rare slice of erudition among a torrent of sitcom silliness, it lasted two seasons, won two Emmies (one of them for Windom's acting), and was summarily cancelled. The show was based on the stories and cartoons of the great James Thurber, and featured animated segments mixed with the live action.

60s sitcoms were famously pitched to appeal to the 12-year-old mind, but I turned 12 in 1969, the year MW&WTI debuted, and I loved it more than any other  –with the possible exception of The Addams Family (1964-66) also based on the work of a New Yorker cartoonist. Windom's show led me to Thurber's writings, which I gobbled up forthwith, along with those of our other great American humorists, Twain and Vonnegut.

Mr. Windom had a successful career, with many other TV roles (including Commodore Decker on Star Trek), and a one-man stage show based on Thurber's work. Condolences to friends and family.

Condolences likewise go out today for director Tony Scott, who helmed True Romance, one of my all-time favorite movies.

Happy Ringoversary!

As reported here, among other places, today marks the 50th anniversary of Richard Starkey's first gig with the Beatles. A lot of attention was paid to the Stones recently having hit the half-century mark, and due commemoration was paid to that band's first-ever gig. But according to Keith Richards, that date does't really count; the Stones weren't really the Stones for him until Charlie Watts became their drummer (on an unknown date in January of 1963).

Likewise, while history was made the day John met Paul, the Beatles weren't really the Beatles as we know them until Ringo sat behind them at the drum kit that 18th of August in 1962. Ringo's personality, his affable singing voice, and his studied avoidance of instrumental ostentation helped cement the Beatles sound and laid the foundations for their success.

According to Mark Lewisohn's definitive Complete Beatles Chronicle, the gig began shortly after 10pm, (afetr a two-hour rehearsal) at Hulme Hall in Birkenhead, in celebration of the local Horticultural Society's 17th anniversary. And according to John Lennon, while the Beatles might have made it without Ringo, it's also probable that Ringo would have made it without the Baetles (though maybe not quite so far):

Ringo was a star in his own right in Liverpool before we even met. He was a professional drummer who sang and performed and had Ringo Starr-time and he was in one of the top groups in Britain but especially in Liverpool before we even had a drummer. So Ringo's talent would have come out one way or the other as something or other. I don't know what he would have ended up as, but whatever that spark is in Ringo that we all know but can't put our finger on — whether it is acting, drumming or singing I don't know — there is something in him that is projectable and he would have surfaced with or without the Beatles. Ringo is a damn good drummer.

Ringo's drumming is often underrated and occasionally denigrated, but listen to his work on "Rain" and "Tomorrow Never Knows," to cite a couple out of many outstanding examples. Moreover, most Beatles songs didn't call for the kind of drumming that Watts or Keith Moon excelled at. It's true that Ringo's solo career served up a number of cringe-worthy moments (as did his colleagues', in smaller ratios), along with some nice pop ear candy. But since sobering up, Ringo has taken his songwriting and recording work more seriously, and has delivered credible efforts in the latter years. So, for instance, give a try to this collaboration with Eric Clapton, a tribute to their mutual pal George. And a happy Ringoversary to you!

Book Tour Update

My booksigning appearance at Kepler's on July 18 has been relocated. The bookstore is doing some remodeling this month, so the event will take place just down the road apiece at the Redwood City Public Library. So meet me in the Fireplace Room at 7pm. Here's the revamped poster for the event:

But that's not all. Kepler's also offered to host a second event at their sister store in San Francisco, Booksmith. That will take place on Monday, July 23 at 7:30 pm. The store is at 1644 Haight Street, and the downloadable poster is below. Hope to see you there!

Join me at Kepler's, July 18

I will be at Kepler's Books & Magazines in Menlo Park CA, on Wednesday, July 18, discussing and signing copies of "The Fully Revised and Updated Second Edition" of The CIA's Greatest Hits. Hope you can join me there, and if not, pass this message on to somebody who can. Here's a poster for the event (if you click to enlarge or download the file, it should print out in fine detail):

Monday Random Ten #37

Here are the first ten songs to pop up on my iPod; Artist/ Song/ Album:

1. The Casuals/ Toy/ Toy - single

2. Lyle Lovett & his Large Band/ Up in Indiana/ It's Not Big It's Large

3. Dum Dum Girls/ Bedroom Eyes/ Only in Dreams

4. Ruth Brown/ It's Love Baby (24 Hours a Day)/ Miss Rhythm

5. The Rolling Stones/ Pain in My Heart/ The Rolling Stones, Now!

6. Ashton Shepard/ Look It Up/ Where Country Grows

7. Steve Goodman/ A Dying Cub Fan's Last Request/ Affordable Art

8. Bob Dylan & the Band/ All Along the Watchtower/ Before the Flood

9. Echo & the Bunnymen/ Bring on the Dancing Horses/ Songs to Learn and Sing

10. Jenny Lewis/ Acid Tongue/ Acid Tongue

Come What May

Happy May Day, workers of the world! Here's a bit of agit-prop to add to the mix: a poster for my upcoming appearance at Revolutionary Grounds. If you click on or download the image, it should show up large enough to reproduce on an 8.5 x 11 sheet.

I have been gradually updating the "Sources" page for The CIA's Greatest Hits, adding a few more links every day or so. The most recent updates are on the Congo, Jonestown, and the Plame Affair. Today a story on CNN caught my eye, regarding a witness to the RFK assassination. She insists she heard a second gunman, and that the LAPD had suppressed her testimony. I will continue to add links on this and other chapters in the days ahead.

Let me know if there's bookstore or radio station near you that would like to host an event spotlighting the dark underbelly of our country's history. And keep on fighting the good fight.

Date Night

Garbus, garbled

As you'll recall, my Pazz 'n' Jop poll vote this year was a tie between Tune-Yards, (who won first place) and St. Vincent (who finished in the money). Then I found out they were touring together. As it turns out, the tour consisted of only four dates, one of which was here in Tucson last Tuesday night, and the last of which is next Tuesday in Oakland. 

The wife and I had a fine meal al fresco at the Hotel Congress patio just before the show; the quinoa veggie burgers, dubbed "Queer Steer," were sublime, as were the Sapphire martinis.  Enjoying the warm evening, we marveled at how much less crappy downtown Tucson has become in the 15 years since we spent our honeymoon night at that same hotel. The gradual gentrification and revitalization has brought some life into the decayed urban core, and we were glad to be a part of it. 

We were even happier to be a part of the crowd witnessing these two amazingly talented women sharing the same stage (though they did not play together). They attracted a nice mix of old and young, gay and straight, and er, white and white. And contrary to their critic's pet scores, Annie Clark of St. Vincent was the headliner, while Merrill Garbus and her band were the support act. I had the pleasure of chatting with Garbus after the show, and let her know that I was honored to have had the privilege of voting for her in the poll. Her response: "Thank you so much for that! Winning that thing totally made my year!"

The Tune-Yards set, at ten songs, was shorter than I would have preferred, but she hit the highlights from her award-winning album with the help of a fine back-up band, consisting of two saxes and a bass player. Merrill herself drew on her background as a solo performer by adding loops and effects to her voice, drums, keyboard and electric ukelele. She opened with an utterly unique scat vocal, mixing in her own backup harmonies in realtime. Then the full band kicked into "Es-So" and then "Gangsta," with the alto and tenor saxmen blending in New York skronk with Kinshasa Afropop. 

We were sorry that our kids, who are big fans, were unable to be there with us. But along with getting her autograph for them on the tour poster, we were able to use the miracle of smartphone technology to make a video of their favorite song, "Bizness," and send it directly to their babysitter. Take that, Twentieth Century!

Our headliner showed an affecting mix of vulnerability and rockstar confidence, a reflection of the ambiguities in her music. What was unambiguously amazing was her supple fretboard work, frequently augmented by a guitar synthesizer. Her background band was also a threesome; in this case a drummer and two keyboard players, one of whom handled the bass tones. 

Clark's playing, singing and songwriting chops reaffirmed the basis for my tie vote. Seeing either one of these women would have been a concert highlight of any year. Together, they made perfect sense, both of them grappling with themes including power imbalances and the allure of violence on both a personal and societal level. Intelligent musicianship of this caliber deserves much wider recognition, and if either band books a stage near you, make sure you get there - and send me a clip.

PS: Smartphone technology not being as smart as one might hope, the photo above of me with Merrill Garbus, which looked fine on the phone, refuses to upload properly. But I included it anyway, since it's a better representation of her fragmented sound than a clean photo would be.

Spy on This

Copies of the "Fully Revised and Updated Second Edition" of The CIA's Greatest Hits should be coming to a bookstore near you this week. If they aren't, ask them why not.

I'll be doing a west coast tour to promote the book this summer, and let me know if there's a bookstore or radio station near you that would like to host me. Here in Tucson I'll be doing a book signing on my birthday, May 25, at Revolutionary Grounds Coffeehouse on 4th Avenue. Stay tuned for future details.

Unlike the 1994 edition, this one is also available as an ebook if you prefer - though I haven't checked it out to see how the illustrations display. The newer cartoons tend to be much more detailed than the older ones, so I'm guessing a tablet or e-reader will work better than your phone if you want the full effect.

This time there will also be an online bibliography, with links to sources where available online. This will be an ongoing project, updated as warranted, but is still a work in progress as of this writing (April seems to have snuck up on me). So stay tuned for more linky goodness to come

This morning I stopped by the customer comment section at Amazon and found all sorts of people saying nice things about me, as well as a few angry critics. One in particular – just coincidentally from Langley, VA – grumbled "I'm sick of you bastards disrespecting the Agency. Come on, you don't know everything they do so just leave them be." Moved by his concern, I added the following comment:

Zepezauer here. I want to thank all the commenters, including my critics. In the introduction to the new edition, I note that my late father-in-law was a career CIA officer. I have nothing but respect for the men and women who risk their lives serving our country. My critique is about the policymakers who believe they can use the agency to "knock off little brown people on the cheap." as one of them put it (in chapter 4). And in the first edition, I also note that all nations need strong intelligence services. This is not book about what the CIA gets right. But as taxpayers and citizens, we have to be alert to fiascos, miscalculations and massacres done in our name, and try to learn from our mistakes. True patriotism requires no less.

Many thanks in advance to all who support this project.

So Long, Davy Jones

There's a column in the Tucson Weekly where they ask various people a series of questions about their musical tastes, including "What was the first album you ever bought?" and "What are your guilty pleasures?"

Well, I have no guilty pleasures, but the former question is easy. I saved up my allowance for weeks to buy the solo album from Davy Jones of the Monkees. In 1966, I was a huge Monkees fan, and I'd already gotten ahold of their existing albums for birthday, Xmas presents, etc. But down at the local Rexall drug store, for probably a buck ninety nine, was the coveted fetish object. Once I had the funds secured, I rode my bike to the strip mall and secured the first of an endless stream of of OCD hunter-gatherer artifacts.

The album was nothing immortal, but my love for the Monkees led me down many a path I still walk today. I had my first radio in my bedroom about that time, and lay awake nights listening to KLIV and KFRC, hoping to catch a Monkees song, and instead awakening to the expanding Big Bang of popular music.

I've no guilt for still loving the Monkees; as Peter Tork says, their song catalogue stacks up quite nicely next to most of their contemporaries, whether they wrote them or not. In any case, they were delivered with verve and charisma, and sound fresh to this day. Many thanks to Mr. Jones, gone too soon, and his mates.

The same column regularly asks, "What was the first concert you ever attended?" And that one is one that got away. My mom got us tickets to see the Monkees, with a warmup act named Jimi Hendrix, but that leg of the tour was canceled for one reason or another. So instead, the first concert I saw was the Dead and Big Brother at the Human Be-In at El Camino Park in 1967. But that's another story completely.

UPDATE: Marc Hirsh makes the case for respecting the Monkees enough to put them in the Hall of Fame:

The simple fact is that if the Hall can (deservedly) induct acts along the lines of the Ronettes, the Temptations and Sam & Dave – none of whom wrote their own music, played their own instruments or were the masters of their own fates – then there's no good reason not to have the Monkees alongside them.

Monday Random Ten # 36

Here are the first ten songs to pop up on my iPod; Artist/ Song/ Album:

1. Soul Coughing/ Super Bon Bon/ Irresistible Bliss

2. Radiohead/ Fake Plastic Trees/ The Bends

3. Lightnin' Hopkins/ Another Fool in Town/ Jake Head Boogie

4. Peter Gabriel/ Don't Give Up/ Shaking The Tree: 16 Golden Greats

5. John Phillips/ Yesterday I Left the Earth/ Andy Warhol Presents “Man On The Moon”

6. Charlie Adams/ T. T. Boogie/ Roots of Rock 'n' Roll, Vol. 8: 1952

7. Patty Griffin/ One Bog Love/ Flaming Red

8. Van Dyke Parks/ Riverboat/ Discover America

9. PJ Harvey/ Lying in the Sun/ The B Sides

10. Kapital/ Souljazz Orchestra/ Manifesto

Pipe Dreams

My beloved right-wing correspondent was kind enough to pass along an NRO article from Victor Davis Hanson, who is always good for a few laughs. In this case he leads off a lengthy kvetch about the Keystone XL pipeline decision by saying "it is hard to remember a presidential decision that had as many negatives as this one."

I guess it's "hard to remember" the downside to the invasion and occupation of Iraq, particularly if, like Mr. Hanson, you were an enthusiastic cheerleader for that particular decision. But GOP support for this dubious Canadian pipeline boondoggle is of a piece with using our troops to install a client regime in an even more lucrative oil patch. In both cases frugality with our tax dollars takes a back seat to subsidizing the fossil fuel barons.

The Republican party (along with its attendant think tanks and journals) is so in thrall to the pipeline of dollars from this 19th century technology that they have led a successful 30-year effort to prevent us from transitioning to 21st century clean energy.

If, instead of removing solar panels from the White House in the Reagan Era, we had started buying them for every government building in America, photovoltaics would by now be cheaper than coal. That prospect, long delayed, is now not too far off, thanks in part to the efforts of our global competitors in Asia and Europe.

Republicans are not content with blocking the removal of corporate welfare for the oil industry (about a half trillion over the past century, and half a trillion a year now, on a global basis). On top of all this they keep whining about the inefficiencies and costs of renewable energy (about $6 billion in subsidies over the last 15 years). Their hypocritical efforts at scandal-mongering over Solyndra serve the same agenda of delaying the inevitable as long as possible – not unlike the white South Africans of the Reagan Era.

Of course, the staggering price for all this foot-dragging will be paid by our children and grandchildren in the form of irreversible climate change, and the attendant war, pestilence and famine. Meanwhile Hanson just can't think of any decisions with more negatives than denying a taxpayer-funded straw into another pool of oil.

To make so ludicrous a claim, the author must assume his readers have forgotten that the GOP deliberately forced the rejection of the Trans-Canada deal because, as one congressional aide candidly stated, “It’s a question of whether we’d rather have the pipeline or the issue.” Well, now they have their issue, but as Hanson's article demonstrates, it's pretty thin gruel.

He bullet-points five separate complaints: One is the snarky invocation of the president's desire for large-scale infrastructure projects. There are innumerable such plans the GOP has blocked or dismissed, not least of which would be the transit systems needed to break our petroleum addiction. Most predictable is the concern-trolling over our vast debt, a legacy of our previous GOP presidents (see also the links in my fifth paragraph).

Hanson waves off environmental concerns, and also strains for a national-security dimension, laughably invoking the Iranian bogeyman. This would hold more water if he hadn't advocated the forcible removal of their chief regional rival, to be replaced by a Shiite-majority regime warmer to the mullahs than any other neighbor.

But of course the whole reason the GOP preferred the pipeline as an issue to the pipeline as a reality is so that they could complain about "job destruction." The subsidizee inflates their claim to 20,000 jobs, and while all construction jobs are temporary, any job in this economy is certainly welcome, especially in that distressed sector. Yet the exaggerated claims have already sparked calls for an SEC investigation, as the numbers given to US authorities are 67 times the job creation claims cited in Canada. Moreover, according to XL's own documents, the number of permanent US jobs arising from a completed pipeline would amount to as little as twenty.

Hanson's concern over job creation would have more credibility if the last Republican administration hadn't presided over an economic collapse that shed nearly nine million jobs before it bottomed out early in Obama's term. Since the recession's trough, the economy has added 2.6 million private-secor jobs. The overall employment number would be even higher if it weren't for GOP obstructionism, leveraging and blackmailing forced-austerity policies that have caused continued public-sector contraction.

After all, suppose that we grant the dubious claim that a subsidized pipeline allowing Canadians to export to world markets through the Gulf of Mexico would create 20,000 jobs. Just last month, the US economy added ten times that many. So good luck making an issue out of this. The only way that will work is if one assumes that a pool of credulous low-information voters is an inexhaustible resource. Oh, wait.

My Mother Writes to Ask

"Objective journalism is one of the main reasons why American politics has been allowed to be so corrupt for so long." -Hunter S. Thompson 

 Mark, what does this mean? please translate for me. thanks.

Hunter Thompson, of course, was anything but objective, not only memorably saturating his stories with his own turbocharged opinions, but, frequently, injecting himself into the events of the story. But he was also part of a larger movement among journalists who acknowledged that the writer inevitably colors the story with his or her own views, and so strove to be upfront about their stances, while still attempting to be as accurate as possible. This is more akin to the European style of journalism. 

And as he stated in the interview from which that quote was taken:

If you consider the great journalists in history, you don't see too many objective journalists on that list. H. L. Mencken was not objective. Mike Royko, who just died. I. F. Stone was not objective. Mark Twain was not objective. I don't quite understand this worship of objectivity in journalism. Now, just flat-out lying is different from being subjective.

The quote refers to Richard Nixon - the next line was "You can't be objective about Nixon." Elsewhere Thompson states that what he wrote about Nixon - specifically, that Nixon was a monster and a crook - was the truth. And that was his truth, as he saw it, which was obvious from everything he wrote about Nixon. But if another journalist's truth was that Nixon was a noble statesman, or that he was just another American politician and should be regarded as such, those truths, too, would be obvious from their writing, whether they tried to conceal it or not.

What Thompson is referring to is the longstanding trope in American journalism whereby the journalist strives to keep his or her own views from being perceived. Instead they speak to influential people from both parties and report what they say, giving each side equal weight.

This allows powerful people to spew pernicious nonsense if they so choose - and choose they do. By dutifully reporting their spin, ostensibly objective journalists become, as media critic David Barsamian put it, "stenographers to power."

The ultimate corruption arising from this format is the treatment of the global warming issue. Knowing that whatever they say would be treated as "one side" of an issue, the fossil fuel barons hired PR firms to churn out propaganda asserting that the planet was not warming, or that if it were, that humanity's industrial processes had nothing to do with it. 

Because powerful people had a vested interest in preventing regulation of their pollution, they "threw sand in the umpire's eyes." This is akin to what the cigarette companies did for so many years before the Surgeon General's report of 1964, or how chemical firms managed to delay the removal of lead from our environment for more than thirty years after European governments had responded to this known neurotoxin.

This corruption allows a handful of people to become fabulously wealthy while dispersing the costs onto the public at large. In this case the costs are dispersed onto the global population, and onto my children's generation. And while these costs are literally incalculable, the scale of this crime makes the tobacco barons look like convenience store burglars. 

As we watch our global climate wrenched into dysfunction, "famine and pestilence" only begins to describe the consequences. Given two decades of studied inaction on the issue, this century will now witness deaths and refugee flows in the hundreds of millions as entire agricultural systems collapse and tropical diseases spread into new populations. Wars over dwindling resources are inevitable, particularly over potable drinking water, as watersheds decline with the snowpack that feeds them. 

Our political paralysis on this issue was bought and paid for - and paid for so well that both conservative voters and the politicians they elect have fallen into step with the industry line. Where just a few years ago, polls showed that voters understood the nature of the problem and wished for it to be dealt with, we now have large numbers of Republican voters denying the truth. Where just a few years ago Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney agreed that climate change was real and should be addressed, now they sow doubt along with their donor base and decry any attempts to regulate carbon as a threat to free enterprise. 

All this was made possible by objective journalists, who knew damn well that a handful of studies subsidized by the vested interests were contradicted by an overwhelming scientific consensus, but who nonetheless dutifully reported "both sides" of the issue. To do otherwise would not be objective, and moreover, would upset major advertisers. 

Thompson was being explicit about the link between this style of corporate journalism and the corruption of our politics, and both trends have only accelerated in recent years. Journalistic enterprises have been more and more dominated by Wall Street interests dictating the bottom line, and politics, particularly since the Citizens United decision, have become more dependent on monied interests than ever. If he hadn't seen it all coming, Hunter Thompson would be flailing and thrashing in his uneasy grave. 

Monday Random Ten #35

Here are the first ten songs to pop up on my iPod; Artist/ Song/ Album:


1. Jane Siberry/ Everything Reminds Me of My Dog/ Bound by the Beauty

2. Clor/ Making You All Mine/ Clor

3. Robyn/ Electric/ My Truth

4. Neu!/ Negativaland/ Neu!

5. BeauSoleil/ Chez Seychelles/ Roots Music: An American Journey

6. Kronos Quartet/ Flugufrelsarinn/ Kronos Plays Sigur Ros

7. Medasyn/ The Battle/ The Battle

8. Jerry Lee Lewis/ Hillbilly Music/ The Sun Years

9. Billie Holiday/ Just One of Those Things/ Songs for Distingué Lovers

10. Huggy Bear/ Her Jazz/ Taking the Rough with the Smooch

Santorum Surges From Behind

Whatever the final tally in last night's Iowa caucuses, that's the obvious headline, given what we know about Santorum. But while humor is an effective political weapon, we have to be careful what we wish for. I can still remember activists hoping for Reagan to get the nomination in 1980, or George H.W. Bush to get the nod in '88, on the grounds that they'd be the easiest to beat.

And as ludicrous as "President Santorum" sounds today, if the economy goes south again, then whoever ends up with the Republican nomination can beat Obama. Under those circumstances, we have to hope that the least crazy among them is the eventual nominee - that is, the least crazy after Jon Huntsman drops out, anyway.

And while, arguably, we might get better results out of President Romney with a Democratic-controlled Congress than from President Obama with a Republican-controlled Congress, the reality is that if the economy deteriorates enough for Obama to be beaten, the GOP will be in control of all three branches, and it won't much matter how sane the president is.

But on the other hand, the best chance at any decent legislation over the coming years is for Obama to win re-election in a landslide, with coattails long enough to hold the Senate (a dicey proposition even in a best-case scenario), and to sweep Pelosi back into the Speaker's chair. So the thing to hope for, first of all, is that the US economy continues to improve and that fiscal conservatives in Europe don 't drag down the global economy with their folly.

And second of all, we have to hope that whoever wins the GOP nomination is as crazy as possible. Since Herman Cain is gone, and given the deep (and justifiable) loathing for Gingrich within the party elites, that makes Senator Man-On-Dog the most plausible candidate for craziest potential nominee and landslide victim.

Of course, back in reality, Citizens United means that GOP party elites are going to nominate who they damn well please and make any chance of a decent Congress a hard-fought battle under any circumstances. So we might as well enjoy the comedy while we can.

Concerts of the Year

Calexico

Tinariwen

Yamato

Old 97s

Harry and the Potters

Robyn Hitchcock/Baseball Project

Roy Zimmerman

Reverb Brothers

S. Carey/Other Lives

Tucson Women's Chorus

Top Tens for Twenty Eleven

Appended below is my Pazz and Jop ballot for 2011 - or it will be if they count it. Apparently Village Voice editors are keeping banker's hours and knocking off work at a respectable hour. Their website wouldn't let me post my vote last night at 6:30. 

Either way, most of these bands should finish well; I haven't included any left-field obscurities such as Micachu and the Shapes or Fol Chen, like I usually do. I hesitate to speculate on who may win the poll this year. There's no obvious frontrunner like Kanye was last year, though PJ Harvey is getting a lot of love out there. 

For the first time in my decade of voting in the P&J poll, I've come up with a tie for first place. The TuNe-YaRdS album was my mainstay this year, and I didn't think I'd love anything more, until I heard Strange Mercy for the first time. Both Garbus and Clark are equally committed, talented and idiosyncratic, and both speak to the disjointed, irrational and fragmented state of our country in 2011. 

All these albums - with the possible exception of Let England Shake - sound like they couldn't have been recorded in any century but this one, though most dab liberally at the palette of music styles established over the last half of the 20th. And all of this is rock music of one sort or another. I haven't voted for any americana or hip-hop as I usually do, though plenty of music from both camps moved me. What moved me most, though, was the new force of rock music these ten albums represent. Rock as a market share is weaker than ever, but artistically it's far from played out. 

Jazz music evolved through phases of exploration until it reached a dead end (of sorts) with free jazz, having gone as far out as possible. Since then, the full range of jazz styles, including free, are available on that palette. The difference is that rock music hasn't gone down any one road, and while it may have hit some dead ends, it's not clear that it's gone as far as it can. But here are ten artists who keep driving on. 

(The rules insist that music writers divide a hundred points amongst ten albums, with no one receiving more than 30 points or less than 5. The headings are Points/ Artist/ Album/ Label):

15 points: TuNe-YaRdS/ whokiill/ 4AD
      Somehow our hero finds inner serenity amongst the violence and chaos around her. What Merril takes from Afropop is the rhythmic dominance, rather than the instrumental exuberance that Peter, Paul and David found. This suits her confident stride through the mean streets of Oakland, the neighborhood you wouldn't want to move to. Above all, her chameleonic voice, whether squawking or crooning, lets you know she's got it handled.

15 points: St. Vincent/ Strange Mercy/ 4AD

      She's seen America naked, and it's just another authority figure to her, like a coach or a surgeon. Ms. Clark tones down some of the overt dissonance of Actor, instead hanging woozy curtains of synths in the window. Occasional bursts of light shine through, whether Talking Heads keyboards or Sonic Youth guitars, describing a world of casual cruelties and emotional violence. But in contrast to Ms. Garbus, her calm in the face of it comes off as unsettling. 

10 points: Radiohead/ King of Limbs/ Self-Released
      Some have lamented the relative lack of Greenwood's guitar, but it's Selway's drumming that is the dominant voice here. Both loose and tight, like Ringo in "Tomorrow Never Knows," the drums anchor the listener through the atmospherics. While Thom moans of mortality and "routines and schedules," dreams of abduction by raptors, or blisses out on the universe, Phil keeps insisting on the moment. 

10 points: Girls/ Father, Son, Holy Ghost/ True Panther Sounds
      What a delicious blend of audacity and vulnerability. The sound of a young man with absolute confidence in the recording studio, but less certainty once he steps outside. Mr. Owens careens from new love to broken heart with one indelible melody after another. In a just world, this would be all over the radio. 

10 points: Black Keys/ El Camino/ Nonesuch
      Cranks up the neo without turning down the retro. Enough of a step up from their previous high standards that it feels like they're just getting started. And this world is just enough that it gets just enough airplay. When my iPod shuffled up to it, my middle school art students, who love only diva pop and thug rap, knew it and grooved to it. Hope for the future. 

10 points: Wilco/ The Whole Love/ dBpm
      Wilco haters gonna Wilco hate, but they deliver for their base better than Boehner or Obama ever will. Call it dad rock if you will; this old dad loves it. But most dads I know - Boomer, GenXer or Millennial - don't rock out with this much eclecticism or commitment. If the history they sample from is their own - some alt.country steel here, a migraine murder ballad there - it just shows that they've earned their place. 

8 points: Kills/ Blood Pressures/ Domino
      Harkens back to a time before the sexual revolution was won, when desire was somehow menacing. It may not seem threatening any more, because the good guys won, but it's still overpowering, and in their hands, both focused and relentless. 

8 points: Cults/ Cults/ Columbia
      Okay, it's no new trick to marry girl-group harmonies to 00s fuzz. Nor is it unique to fuse that sunny optimism with darker lyrics. Part of what makes it work are the moments of precocious wisdom in a band so young. Like all strong debuts, it begs the question of what's next - continue to mine this vein, or consolidate and move on? But for now, not a waste of time. 

7 points: PJ Harvey/ Let England Shake/ Island
      A career highlight in a career studded with them. Redolent of British folk rock to the point where it was recorded in an old church - and not coincidentally, one perched on the white cliffs of Dover. While the songs look across the channel to contemplate imperial slaughters of a century hence, it's not hard to make the connection to newer ones further south. 

7 points: Yuck/ Yuck/ Fat Possum
      If you're gonna reach back to 20th-century rock styles, that last decade is fertile ground to plow. They've got style; miles and miles. And not without substance, either - but as to whether all that style is wasted, see question for Cults, above. 

Singles

Girls/ Honey Bunny/ True Panther Sounds

Beastie Boys/ Don't Play No Game That I Can't Win/ Capitol

Hanni El Khatib/ Build. Destroy. Rebuild./ Innovative Leisure

Panda Bear/ Last Night At the Jetty/ Paw Tracks

Gang Gang Dance/ Mindkilla/ 4AD

Beyonce/ Countdown/ Sony

Danger Mouse & Daniele Luppi (Ft. Jack White)/Two Against One/ Capitol

Black Keys/ Lonely Boy/ Nonesuch

Wild Flag/ Glass Tambourine/ Merge

James Blake/ The Wilhelm Scream/ Universal Republic

Monday Random Ten - Best of 2011 Edition

As of today there are 627 songs in my "2011" folder. These are the first ten to pop up on my iPod, Aritst/Song/Album.

1. Group Doueh/ Ishadlak Ya Khey/ Zayna Jumma

2. The Sea and Cake/ Covers/ The Moonlight Butterfly

3. Wye Oak/ Plains/ Civilian

4. The Kills/ Nail in my Coffin/ Blood Pressures

5. Blitzen Trapper/ Might Find It Cheap/ American Goldwing

6. Mati Zundel/ Aero Tinku/ Cuando Yo Bailo, Tiembla La Tierra

7. Major Lazer/ Keep It Goin' Louder [So Shifty Remix]/ Mad Decent vol. 1

8. Best Coast/ Gone Again/ Adult Swim Singles Program 2011

9. Forró In the Dark, Brazilian Girls & Angelique Kidjo/ Aquele Abraço/ Red Hot + Rio 2

10. Atlas Sound/ The Shakes/ Parallax

Monday Random Ten #34

Here are the first ten songs to pop up on my iPod; Artist/ Song/ Album:


1. Teenage Fanclub/ Star Sign / Four Thousand

2. The Pharcyde/ Passin' Me By/ Bizarre Ride II

3. Beach House/ Norway/ Teen Dream

4. Okkervill River/ Lost Coastlines/ The Stand Ins

5. The Contours/ Do You Love Me/ Motown: The Classic Years

6. Jenny Lewis (feat. Elvis Costello)/ Carpetbaggers/ Acid Tongue

7. PJ Harvey/ Grow Grow Grow/ White Chalk

8. Turin Brakes/ Monnlight Mile/ Bottled at Source

9. Bad Brains/ Pay to Cum/ Bad Brains

10. George Harrison/ Give Me Love (Give Me Peace on Earth) Live in Japan

That Time of Year

No, not that time. It's the time of year when music geeks everywhere are contemplating their year-end Top Ten Lists. But this year no list-making can commence until this coming Tuesday, when the Black Keys and the Roots will drop El Camino and undun, respectively.

Major releases don't often come out this late in the year; labels try to time their critical buzz, just like studios hold back their Oscar contenders. But these two discs seem to be worth waiting for. The tracks that have leaked so far are oozing awesomeness. The Keys just kicked my butt across the room with "Little Black Submarines," and the vitality of their sound is just my thermos of tea, simultaneously neo and retro. Both albums look like strong contenders for my Top Ten - though as always, there are a lot more than ten strong contenders, and the painful task is winnow them down until ten are left standing.

To my mind, some of the best albums of 2011 were by women. I've already written about Tune-Yards, and the St. Vincent album Strange Mercy is also one of my favorites. PJ Harvey's Let England Shake is one of her best in many years, and of course everybody loves Adele and Florence. I can see those last two cleaning up at Grammy time. Newcomers Cults and Wild Flag are also likely to turn up on a lot of lists.

The other new band I fell for was Yuck, a couple of British chaps with a strong '90s vibe (who have their own blog over here). The Kills also killed me, as previously mentioned. I got a big kick out of the third album by Gang Gang Dance. And then old favorites like Wilco, Stephen Malkmus, Tom Waits and TV on the Radio delivered strong sets as well.

That's sixteen names I've mentioned already, without even bringing up the Radiohead album. Or Bon Iver. Or James Blake. You can see I have my work cut out for me. But next post I'll mention a few of the also-rans that might make good stocking-stuffers for someone on your list.

Monday Random Ten #33

Here are the first ten songs to pop up on my iPod; Artist/ Song/ Album:


1. The Ventures/ Pipeline/ The Best of the Ventures

2. Matt Pond PA/ People Have a Way/ Last Light

3. Jets to Brazil/ Resistance is Futile/ Orange Rhyming Dictionary

4. Dead Kennedys/ Rawhide/ Dead Kennedys

5. The Eagles/ Take It Easy/ The Very Best of the Eagles

6. Iron & Wine/ Innocent Bones/ The Shepard's Dog

7. The Plugz/ Hombre Secreto (Secret Agent Man)/ Repo Man Soundtrack

8. Cake/ You Turn the Screws/ Prolonging the Magic

9. Frank Black & the Stax Pistols/ Breathless/ Brace Yourself! A Tribute to Otis Blackwell

10. Totó La Momposina y sus Tambores/ Curura/ La Candela Viva


When I was a radio DJ I used to love incongruous segues, but it never occurred to me to play the DKs back-to-back with the Eagles. Thanks, iPod!

Totó La Momposina is the stage name of Colombian singer Sonia Bazanta Vides.

Otis Blackwell wrote more than a thousand songs, including "Don't Be Cruel," "Fever," "Great Balls of Fire," "Return to Sender," "Handy Man," and "All Shook Up."

Jets to Brazil was an American band that released three great albums between 1998 and 2002. The frontman Blake Schwarzenbach was previously with the punk band Jawbreaker, and now makes his living as an English professor.

Matt Pond PA is the eponymous band of prolific New York-based songwriter Matt Pond. Not sure what the PA is for.