Since my last post I feel like I’ve need­ed some­one to RSS-cue me. I’ve been swept up by my new job pret­ty com­plete­ly, engrossed in Joshua Fer­ris’ amaz­ing new nov­el, and writ­ing brief reviews for Paper Thin Walls when I get chance [Keep an eye out for Low and Von Suden­fed.] I’ve missed shows I meant to see [Noisettes/TVOTR and Spoon. Real­ly sor­ry about Noisettes (see video) but a funer­al took me out of town.] and have been gen­er­al­ly remiss, if not gross­ly neg­li­gent when it comes to music blog­ging late­ly. I’m hope­ful that a quick round-up of links will serve as a suf­fi­cient short­hand for what I’m into lately.

• Bat­tles refute a NYTimes char­ac­ter­i­za­tion. I don’t buy it.
• Ton­ic closed and jazz­bos will have to find cheap­er places to drink.
• Inter­pol returned.
• This Parts & Labor pho­to cracked me up.
• Malk­mus updat­ed us.
• Son­ic Youth? Still Day­dream­ing.
• Jodor­owsky’s Holy Moun­tain re-emerged.
• Andrew Hill left us.
• So did Lob­by Loyde.
• Lichens freak me out.
• The Phillies are on a four game win streak. [I went to see them mop up the Astros, 11–4.]

Dear Mark Ronson,

Where’d that bril­liant­ly boun­cy ver­sion of “Just” go? That was inspired. This is just reheat­ed. I say this know­ing it will be a tremen­dous hit some­where because the source mate­r­i­al is so good and that cov­ers typ­i­cal­ly fare well in rock his­to­ry, etc. etc.

Also, I don’t care if you asked per­mis­sion from Mor­ris­sey and Marr. It makes me think less of them know­ing that they allowed you to go ahead with this.

Sin­cere­ly,

Black­mail Is My Life

Miss­ing Blues Con­trol’s recent show at Big Jar Books is a sore dis­ap­point­ment. Why? Just lis­ten for your­self [via Raven Sings The Blues aka RSS trea­sure trove.] Also because Max and Bryan at AKA told me so, and I trust them. Like broth­ers. Seri­ous­ly. Once I lay hands on a copy of Puff I’ll be sure to expound on why I should’ve been there.

I’ve been bad­mouthing The Fad­er all week, but then they had this remix of MIA’s “Bird Flu” and it made me feel all aru­lar inside all over again.