claro!

from the NME...

(this one's for E-beth and J Mo)

Oasis praise The Gossip

Noel Gallagher compliments Beth Ditto's voice

28.Feb.07 10:40am

The Gossip have revealed that Oasis are big fans of theirs.

Speaking exclusively in this week's issue of NME, frontwoman Beth Ditto said that Noel Gallagher complimented her voice.

Ditto said the band were personally invited to Oasis BRIT Awards afterparty. She said: "Noel Gallagher said I had one of the best voices in rock. To me that's great.

"I had a huge Oasis poster on my wall when I was in junior high. This was Arkansas, where no-one has heard of Oasis."

I did it

I got meeself published in a glossy (local) mag!

Take a gander at this month's Metro, if you wanna read about people who adore The Purple One. (Why I was so purple a few months ago.) A great, crazy experience that will live in readers' minds for a matter of minutes...cuz you know what they say...people forget what they read in magazines as soon as their eyes leave the page.

sigh

go AL!

I first heard about Al running for Senate from Fitzy, when we were in Seattle. Our friends Lance and Jodi, from Duluth, sent him an email with this photo: their baby, Myla, posing with Al in a spin on the "politician with baby photo op." Fucking brilliant. Don't you love her expression? She's all business when it comes to being a Blue State Baby.

Also: watch this. it's 8 minutes, and it's great. Using FDR's "freedom from fear" has never been so needed, now. I love you, Al!

hilariously implausable advice

"Lay low and return lucid, humble and gorgeous, with a cutting-edge pop smash single."

-what Britney Spears needs to do, according to Epic records exec Keith Naftaly (snagged it from EW)

Sorry to even weigh in on such a non-story about someone as worthless and lame as a box of hair.

Strangely, I *just* read the Chuck Klosterman interview with Spears from 2003 (thanks to Paul) as this whole "omg-she-fucking-*shaved*-her-head" "story" "broke." heh. Of course, it's as entertaining (and infuriating) as it could be, cuz Klosterman's doing it. ("...either Britney Spears is the least self-aware person I've ever met, or she's way, way savvier than I shall ever be. Or maybe both.")

[also listened to Mary Lucia interview Klosterman. fucking great. woulda loved to seen 'em at the Fitz Theater]

Better is the portrait of male Latino teenagers obsessed with Morrissey.

More on that later.

read this guy's blog

I endorse, yet again.

Jeff, the freckled, complex Marine who is a damn fine writer. Shedding a lil' light on what it's like for them... "over there."

http://midnight.hushedcasket.com/

The Emerald City

Yes, fair readers-I'm ditchin' the winter-dead MPLS and heading to wet and warm(er) Seattle, land of Hendrix, Heart and Citizen Dick, er-I mean "Singles." Also, new home to the Great Exodus of the Midwest: several of my good friends (from MN) are now living there and loving it. This will be my first time seeing the joint, including Paul's Tacoma, and we're staying for 9 days, so it should be a pretty good intro.

I am giddy with excitement over spending such a big ol' chunk of time with Fitzy, seeing E-Beth, Paul, Sarah and Emily. I also can't hardly wait to feel rainy, 50-degree air on my skin (fantasize that it's spring) and bum around (what sounds like) a great walking city. There will be music adventures and more...

Don't know if I'll have time or access to blog (ugh, I hate using that as a verb. sorry.) but I am going to try. For realz.

See yooz on the flip side.

Uh oh

"the man who invented soul"

Fitzy sends me.

He sent me this Sam Cooke clip from American Bandstand because the song got in his head after reading something I wrote him.



Little does he know...(he'll know now) this particular clip has major significance to me. In the year 2000, I went to L.A. with my dad, who grew up there. We were all giddy to check out the Museum of Television and Radio in Beverly Hills. You can get yourself a lil' secluded station with a monitor and access 50 years of television within minutes. I, of course, went straight to the American Bandstands of old. I pulled up Bobby Darin, the Jackson Five and .... Sam Cooke.

(this is before YouTube, you hafta remember. so this access felt so goddamn special--a pop culture treasure hunt.)

I knew I liked the man with that smooth, impeccable delivery who sang "Cupid" and "Chain Gang" but never knew much about him. Recently, I had been learning more about him and his music. I found out that he, like so many other black soul artists, sang gospel before going secular/pop which upset many of his early, religious fans. But what most impressed me was that he was not only an amazing performer, but a brilliant songwriter as well. So damn rare for that era. His stirring, emotional "A Change Is Gonna Come" was the black version of "Blowing in the Wind," (which he said "should have been written by a black man") and he was extremely active in civil rights. And, most disturbing of all, his sudden death. Getting shot in a motel under bizarre circumstances...was such an unjust way for a musical legend to go (Marvin Gaye: same shit, John Lennon...wtf.)

SO..........watching the man do his thing. For the first time. With over sized, old school headphones, in a lil' cubicle...I saw him perform this song in its entirety.

I cried, and cried and couldn't stop. It was him--his presence, his movements, his smile. The way he sauntered on to the stage, he was superfuckingcool. The coolest. I finally could see the man in motion, set to the voice I adored. The Voice--the phrasing, the tone, that velvet touch of soul. Unlike anyone else. And, of course, thinking of his death (he was only 32 years old, fer chissakes), the senselessness of it...made me blubber, too. But it was his music that moved me. It was a strange feeling to be sitting there, alone, in a library-like setting, just sobbing silently. Watching and hearing Mr. Cooke, The Man Who Invented Soul (that's the perfect name of my Sam Cooke box set) will do that to a girl like me.

Thanks, Fitzy.
(...and you alone were meant for me)

oh. wow.

Johnny Marr sez so!!!

punk rock festival 1977!

MONT DE MARSAN, France—A punk-rock festival at an ancient bullfighting arena features more than 15 different bands from all over Europe, 1977.

Check out these fucking rad Magnum photos on Slate! They are truly radical.