No, they didn’t play “Watch Her Flow.”  But that can be forgiven, I suppose.

Exhibit A.

Anyway, putting aside my blogging frequency, I wrote a little something-something recently.  What is it you ask?  Well, I’ll tell you.

In this aforementioned something, I argue that one can reasonably advocate the censorship of (certain types of) pornography on first-amendment grounds. Basically, pornography may silence women, and if so, we have reason to ban it.

Sexy, no?

Of course I’m not sure I actually believe this (and if I do, then my interweb browsing habits demonstrate my woman-silencing tendencies) but, nonetheless, here it is, on (digital) paper.

I’ll warn you though, it’s not nearly as interesting as it sounds. Philosophy of Language rarely is.

A dead guy named Paul, to be exact. A dead guy named Paul who is a ghost. And at one point, a dead guy named Paul, who is a ghost, who is on a plane. Sound exciting? Well it isn’t, and that’s entirely what makes it funny.

I’m interested to see where this comik goes – if he sticks with Paul who is a ghost, or moves on to other characters and concepts. Given what I’ve seen so far, I’d be happy with either, as long as he keeps the tone and style of humor.

Anyways, enough bad analogies from me for one day, just check it out yourself:

I decided to move closer to downtown Burlington. Not because I particularly like downtown, but mostly because this way I’m walking distance to the liquor store. Also a bonus is that the apartment includes a rather nice porch that I can monkey around on, and yell at the fucking hippies walking to and from UVM parties.

The not so nice part is that my bedroom was covered with god-awful floral pattern tan wallpaper. So I have spent the better part of my holiday weekend spackling and painting. (Sidebar: what in the fuck is Labor Day even for? Sounds like a commie holiday to me.) So now, on Monday afternoon, with freshly off-white walls, I can finally stop sleeping on the living room floor.

I hate moving. Painting wasn’t especially fun either.

It’s February.  2007.  The last thing the INTRAWEBS needs right now is another “Best of 2006″ list.  Three major problems with those lists:  1) good albums aren’t really made anymore, 2) lists like those almost always suck mainly because, 3) the people that write those lists kind of suck.   As a result, I’ve given in to the whole “mix-tape-listen-to-a-couple-songs-off-an-album-then-throw-the-rest-away-short-attention-span” thing that relatively common nowadays.  That’s why every couple of weeks I’ll be adding a short list of the songs/artists/albums I’ve been listening to a lot.  Some of it will be old.  Some of it will be new.  Some of it I’ll put on just to try to impress you.

• Page France — Hello, Dear Wind — 2004

• The Olivia Tremor Control — “Jumping Fences”/”Define  a Transparent Dream” — Music from the Unrealized Film Script ‘Dusk at Cubist Castle’ — 1996

• The New Pornographers — The Electric Version – 2003

• My Bloody Valentine — “Only Shallow” — Loveless – 1991

• Curtains — “World’s Most Dangerous Woman” — Calamity — 2006

A few things that have been stuck on repeat in my CD player.

• “Built in Girls” — The Wrens ; Secaucus ; 1996

• Aesop Rock — Labor Days ; 2003

• “Somerville” — The Pernice Brothers ; Live a Little ; 2006

• National Anthem of Nowhere — Apostle of Hustle ; 2007

• God Don’t Make No Junk — The Halo Benders ; 1994

I like concerts. I go to a lot of concerts. I go to a lot of good concerts. But there are only five on this list. Why, you ask? Because these are my most favoritest concerts. Of all time. They were really, really good. And that’s why there are my favorite. And that’s why they are on this list. Enjoy.

1. The Hold Steady; TT the Bear’s Place, Cambridge MA; 11 September 2005

Seeing the Hold Steady live is like doing crack: the first time is universe-altering, the subsequent three or four times are life changing and you become addicted, and any more than that will make you fear for your well-being. (This, of course, coming from a person who has never done crack. It’s all hearsay.) This show was universe-altering. Besides the fact that TT’s is about as big as a living room and we were basically sitting on the stage for their set, it was, most importantly the first time I saw my favorite band. The set was heavy on their most popular tracks (“Yr Little Hoodrat Friend”, “The Swish”), but it was also the first (and probably last) time we’ll ever hear the band play songs like “Crucifixtion Cruise”. The raw energy running through the band was absolutely palpable. Before the Pitchfork ratings, before the Spin articles, before the Bowdoin party pit, this was the quintessential Hold Steady show: loud, unapologetically drunk, and songs that make it acceptable to hug your neighbor, spill beer on your girlfriend, and hi-five the guitarist after a solo. Every person needs to experience this.

2. Spoon, Crooked Fingers, Fiery Furnaces; Middle East Downstairs, Cambridge MA; 7 April 2003

When did I realize that this show was going down as one of my all-time greats? Was it when Eleanor Friedberger danced next to me after the Furnaces’ set? Or maybe when it was when a bare-footed, mustacio’ed cowboy from Crooked Fingers was grinding with his upright bass in a way that would have made a porn star blush? Perhaps it was when Spoon played “Paper Tiger” and I nearly kissed Mort in a moment of lucid euphoria. Britt Daniel drank too much, instigated his band mates, and played the heck out of some incredibly catchy pop tunes. And we had a front row view for the mayhem. You know a show is worthy of a top spot when you put on the band’s albums on the ride home and rock out as hard as you did at the show.

3. Radiohead; Tweeter Center, Mansfield, MA; 21 August 2003

Ho-hum. Just your average 2.5 hour setlist playing twenty-six of the greatest songs of our generation, I suppose. How good are Radiohead live? I was alone, sober, and in the 57th row of a sizable stadium, and the sight of Jonny Greenwood hunched over his axe, buzz-sawing his way through “Just” illicited The World’s Best Fist Pump Ever.

4. Colin Meloy; TT the Bear’s Place, Cambridge, MA; 2 February 2005

Coline Meloy (and please excuse the cliched fan-boy reference here) was clearly meant for the stage. He could have been a great actor or a stellar comedian. Hell, he could have lived in the 17th century and done dramatic Shakespearan readings and still gotten the chicks. Instead he decided to write a bunch of great songs and then play them live. Throughout the course of the evening, he led the crowd in handclaps to set the beat for “Los Angeles, I’m Yours”, played a never-before heard b-side from Her Majesty, and told jokes about Saadam Hussein effigies. He also finished out the set with the single greatest song I have ever seen live: a 10-minute rendition of “California One/Youth and Beauty Brigade”, in which Meloy single-handedly played the lead guitar, bass, and percussion at the same time.

5. Some Random Weezer Cover Band; TT the Bear’s Place, Cambridge, MA; 29 October 2006

Holy shit.  Where to begin?  In the history of never ending indie rock math equations, this may have been the strangest possible combination of factors.  Ok, let’s try this out: shitty emo-pop band + dressing up exactly like Weezer * playing The Blue Album note for note / 12 people in attendence ^ DKraft and I turning TT’s into Stowe Inn 101 or Mayflizzle 4 by jumping around and yelling into the “speakers” ! getting the entire crowd from shoe-gazing foot-tappers to moshing banshees during “Say It Ain’t So” = The best $8 I ever spent.  Honestly, if I had a lighter, it would have been blazing the whole 37 minutes.

So other than not posting, and not having new music to rant about, what has one Mr. pin “dkraft” tao been up to recently?

I almost died on Halloween when I hit a deer on I-89 coming back from a Hold Steady show in Boston.  $3000 later and the Saturn has a secksy new front end.

Still rocking the greater Burlington, VT area as a Wireless Network Engineer.   Recent accomplishments include the design and deployment of a WLAN/Public Hotspot for BTV – Burlington International Airport.  Basically I was stuck in an airport all week, but for money.

Last weekend I won 19 consecutive games of “Beruit.”  Apparently it is played with 10 cups, which compared to the Bowdoin style I am trained in, is fucking easy.

Tonight I actually sat through an entire movie with Ben Stiller.  It was in a museum or something.

In retrospect, not much happened.  That means I really have no excuse for not posting.  Well, such is life.  And it is now time to wrap Fishmas presents.

1. “Lonely in a Limousine” — Lftr Pllr — Fiestas and Fiascos

Wow, another Lftr Pllr song about drug dealing! Horray! This time around it’s not just peddling a couple of ounces to some petty thief: the stakes are much higher if you’re hanging out on the Cape, taking a bus to NYC, and flying to Paris. Craig Finn’s shady, back-alley protagonists are not usually the type to be driving around in limousines and hanging out in airports, but don’t confuse the location of the song for any sort of classiness. Double shots in an airport bar, Camel lights, and Sandy staggering drunk up to the steps of the plane: classic Finn-isms. The band never sticks with a musical idea for more than 10 seconds. After 2:18 of spastic, math-y rock, you’ve come down and you’re ready for another hit.

2. “The Orchids” — Califone — Roots and Crowns

This song dominated my iTunes playlists and mixtapes so thouroughly and so quickly that I now have a measuring stick for new friends’ musical taste known as “The Orchids”. It’s pretty simple: I play “The Orchids” for you. If you like it, I like you. If you don’t, you have horrible musical taste. That is all I can say about this track. Un-freaking-believeable.

3. “Scenic World” — Beirut — Gulag Orkestar

This song is so innsidiously catchy you’ll have to have to use a jackhammer to bore it out of your cranium. This song is so suguary-sweet-melodic you’ll have to go to the dentist to get 45 cavities removed. This song is could have been the title track to a collaboration between Neutral Milk Hotel and Architecture in Helsinki. But most importantly, this song pissed off DKraft. That’s why it’s so high on my list.

4. “Stuck Between Stations” — The Hold Steady — Boys and Girls in America

The Hold Steady are now three-for-three when it comes to kicking off their albums with fucking brilliant songs. This may be one of their best songs. Ever. It is the perfect storm of literary references, storying telling, drinking/drugging motifs, classic rock riffs, and Piano Solos of Doom. Don’t get me wrong: I love the rest of BaGiA, but if every song on that album were half as good as this, it would have been the greatest album ever made.

5. “The Crane Wife 3″ — The Decemberists — The Crane Wife

DKraft correctly noted that the bass line in this song is tits-a-licious. Which is funny because being a bad-ass bassist or dropping a bad-ass bassline in indie rock is soooo unnecessary. I think John Darnielle once said that calling his fellow Mountain-Goat bassist “the best bassist in indie rock” was the most backhanded compliment he’d ever given. Anyway, I’m getting off the point here about “The Crane Wife 3″: Chris Funk not only has one of the best names in indie rock, but he’s also a stellar bassist. I would dare say he’s the best bassist in indie rock. Sorry, Chris.

by Sideshow

This was the first Mountain Goats show that I’ve ever been to.

(Wait. That’s not entirely true. Let’s start this again.)

This was the first time I remember being at a Mountain Goats show. Don’t know why I can’t recollect the first one I went to. Must have been that quesadilla at EAT.

In either case, it’s a real shame I don’t remember the first one, but one would be hard pressed to argue that anything could have topped this show that John Darnielle and Peter Hughes put on. There are two things that really stood out to me about the show: first, how incredibly percussive The Mountain Goats’ music is despite not having a drummer for their live shows; and second, how great a performer/showman Darnielle is. Whether he screamed at a window-piercing decibal or whispered at a barely audible level, whether his words were jarring and visceral or delicate and lonely, Darnielle held the audience in rapt attention.

They opened with a version of “Wild Sage” that was so minimal and quiet I almost thought that Darnielle’s guitar was turned off.  Turns out, it was. It was not until after the song that he informed the tech guys that the input had died. This allowed a hilarious exchange between Darnielle and Hughes, with the former informing us that the latter was “unquestionably the best bassist in indie rock.” As Hughes pointed out, this was quite a backhanded compliment.

Perhaps feeling that after one quiet song and some banter the show had commenced on an awkward foot, the Goats proceeded to rock out on some old and well known tracks. “Color in Your Cheeks” got the whole crowd chanting and chugging, and “Broom People” was sparse and stunning even without the piano that drives the melody on the record. “Dance Music” proved to be one of those songs that gets even the most stoic and clever hipster to give an ass-shake or two. I’m pretty sure that I saw more high-fives at the begining of the song than at an entire AC/DC concert.

People were starting to freak out and Darnielle picked up on this quickly, egging the crowd on to an absolute frenzy: “I absolutely fuckin’ love you guys.” “This is best crowd I’ve seen all year.” Then: “If I ever forget Cambridge, I hope I perish from God’s great earth”, and with his eyes afire, glasses off, and sweat dripping from every pore, Darnielle ripped into the familiar riff of “This Year”. It may have not been the first mosh pit at a Mountain Goats show, but it certainly was the most loving and joyous I’ve even been a part of. With the crowd knowing every word and clapping along to every beat, you could see the pure joy of being on stage through Darnielle’s expression. Pure unadulterated joy. I suppose when you are able to get 300 indie kids jumping, clapping, and singing “I can feel the alcohol inside of me hum!”, I would be awfully fucking excited too.

For the oncore, Darnielle took off his guitar strap, un-hooked the microphone and did a R. Kelly-style version of Nothing Painted Blue’s “Houseguest”, which may in fact be the funniest/disturbing song I’ve ever heard. Introducing the last song of the night, Darnielle noted with a genuine smile that “somewhere, at sometime, all of you will experience what goes on in this song. I wish it didn’t, but it will so you might as well be fucking prepared for it.” We were not, however, prepared for “No Children”. It’s hard to describe the electricity that went through the crowd during the song, but we all knew something special was happening. A song that was rarely played live, plus a crowd that was as amped as I’d ever seen equaled a glorious ending to the show.

The end-of-the-show music started, the crowd filed away from the stage, rubbing their faces in disbelief and trying to etch the details of the last few songs in their brains. I sat down on the stage to collect myself and let the crowd thin out before I left. Thirty seconds later, Darnielle ran back on stage to grab his notebook that he’d forgotten. As we all give one last cheer of approval, one guy in the back said “He’s playing one more song!!” Of course, he wasn’t. But as 300 indie kids wheeled around and rushed back to the stage, Darnielle looked caught off guard. “Well, I suppose I can’t come out here and not play another song.” He genuinely looked like he didn’t want to disapoint us.

He picked up a guitar and started to strum a few chords, and said “I wrote this song on Christmas Day of 1994″. Sensing that we were witnessing something really epic, Darnielle calmly deadpanned: “The most remarkable thing about coming home to you is the feeling of being in motion again.”

Yes. It was “Going to Georgia”. And no, none of us were ready to go home after that.