foxy!

you got to hand it to sub pop - always coming up with a band that just makes one go "wow". fleet foxes fall into this category and i fought it as i thought they were pretty good. i was wrong. now i keep listening to them and find them getting better with every listen. and now you can download a pretty damn good version of the fleet foxies with wilco doing the dylan chestnut, "i shall be released" right here. hit that link and find a genius stroke on the part of wilco asking people to kindly VOTE this year and i am going to pull no punches, VOTE FOR AN OBAMA-BIDEN TICKET! haven't we all had enough of this shameful campaign senator john mcshame and his running mate sarah "abstinence does not work in my family" palin. don't think twice friends...

and if you want to hear this in action live, here you go - WILCO and FLEET FOXES doing what the BAND made famous and doing it right!

da mystery of chessboxin'

what? music can create a variety of emotions however when it can create many emotions all at once, magic happens. although that situation can happy with many varieties of music (hello fela!) i recently was listing to the wu tang clan and felt sincerity (method man, u-god, raekwon), crazy scary emotions (ol' dirty bastard, gza's beats) and joy from the entire song structure. check out this awesome video of "protect yr neck" a classic if ever there was one.

a mix-up a variety of different new yorkers, wu-tang is like no other group...so many personalities, so much varied talent along with tons of crazy ideas, you have one of the most diverse groups ever. just check out their debut here and get on it son.

what's good?

everybody had/has musical mentors. i believe there are a small percentage of people who are born with distinct taste and i can only think of one guy when i was growing up as a teenager who just had his finger on everything cool and right on yet he told me he had some guidance also. i had two early ones when i was probably sixteen telling me what is really the stuff and one was a guy named joe hudson. don't know where joe is today but he knew what seemed like everything good - movies and a caustic sense of humor were what i actually liked most about him however he would drive me to zed records in long beach and along with some mix tapes being played on the drive, i got an education. one of the first punk shows i went to was the weirdos , the plugz, the suburban lawns and i believe the penatrators at baces hall in hollywood. it took my 16 year old head completely off and to this day, i thank you joe hudson. if i recall correctly, joe's favorite band was the screamers however they were history in mid-1979 and his next favorite was the weirdos. i can't hear "we got the neutron bomb" without thinking of that great show and joe - a true musical mentor and the guy never played a note on any instrument but he could honk his horn on his car like nobody else.

pink floyd

i really wanted to write about pink floyd but i am instead going to write about wilco. i think they have a lot in common yet i will not explain why i think that. wilco. hmmm, wilco. i know a lot of music pals of mine would scoff at them but that seems like such an easy route to take. consider this, they are not misunderstood nor underappreciated, i think a lot of folks simply take great songwriting for granted. jeff tweedy and company are not from the south (and ditto for john fogerty and neil young) yet he writes with the prose of a great southern storyteller like faulkner or o'connor. although it is well over a year old, i think the latest offering from wilco "sky blue sky" is a god damn classic. here's a video for the title track - enjoy.

good george!!

i love george jones. i can't see why anybody would not...he writes his own stuff, sings like a champ, drinks and womanizes - this guy just rules. and i love it the most when he duets - and god knows he's sang with EVERYONE! let's see, merle, willie, loretta, tammy, elvis costello, and you can find a shit load more right here on this link! now click on the above video to check out george in action - ALONE...a living legend this guy!