Random thoughts:
- The war of words between The New York Times and General Motors continues. If you remember, The Times published an op-ed last week that, among other things, labeled GM a “crack-dealer for America” in regards to its incentives to get the general public to buy more SUV’s and then The Times went on to accuse GM of buying votes in Congress. No small matter. GM responded on its blog right away and now GM has gone public in detailing the events of trying to get a letter published in the New York Times telling their side of the story. You would think it’s only fair, right? Alas, the two parties couldn’t come to an agreement on the final wording of the letter. It basically came down to one single word, in fact: “rubbish.” See the details as posted by GM’s Brian Akre, including a fairly amusing exchange via email that I am really glad GM made available to the public. I love the internet.
- This morning’s Boston Globe ran a story about the digitally remastered albums being released today by the ’70s rock icons Boston. Their self-titled debut album, at the time, was the largest selling debut by any music act until Whitney Houston came along. Personally, I find much of Boston’s music is a little like hitting “repeat” on the CD player – it kind of all sounds the same to me, with the glaring exception of the big hit “More Than A Feeling,” which I believe to be one of the greatest “radio songs” of all time. Note I didn’t say “greatest songs of all time.” To me, there’s a large chasm between a “radio song” and a “song.” I don’t know about you, but if I ever hear “More Than A Feeling” on the radio, I turn that bitch up. Loud. And I sing along fanatically, without a prayer of ever hitting the notes the Brad Delp hits. However, I do not own the song in any format and I don’t believe I ever have. That, my friends, is a radio song. See the piece from this morning’s Globe here, an entertaining back-and-forth riff between Globe music writers Sarah Rodman and Joan Anderman, debating the merits of Boston.
- I am so loving YouTube. Where else can you type in almost anything you want and get videos of it? I mean, who even knew that the Flying Burrito Brothers cut a video for “Older Guys?” My favorite part is the dude who pops out of the boat hatch for the “whooo-hooo-hooo” chorus, but the whole thing is a bit of a joy to watch. The Flying Burrito Brothers were a sadly overlooked entity. A few weeks ago, my left-coast friend Fort Miley blogged about this absolute gem from YouTube, which features R.E.M.’s first national television appearance on the David Letterman show, performing a song that was, according to bass player Mike Mills “too new to be named.” The song later went on to be a little ditty called “South Central Rain (I’m Sorry).” I get such a kick out of Micheal Stipe in this video, all of 21 or 22, being all aloof sitting in the background while Letterman does a one-minute chat with the band before the song. YouTube makes me want to get out a buy a video camera and post some vids.
- Speaking of which, there’s no shortage on the amount of bizarre videos you can find on YouTube, too. In fact, you could spend all damn day wondering what the world is really doing with their lives. One thing that really had me cracking up, though, was a young Sloan performing “The Good In Everyone” – complete with a large monkey and uncomfortable adults, all dancing together on what I can only imagine is some kind of Canadian variety show. Classic.