Why the Record Industry Sucks, Aleph-nought in a Series

As a companion piece to Steve Albini’s famous rant about how the pop music industry systematically screws its artist, theToo Much Joy blog provides a look at their royalty statement: I got something in the mail last week I’d been wanting for years: a Too Much Joy royalty statement from Warner Brothers that finally included… Continue reading Why the Record Industry Sucks, Aleph-nought in a Series

Poll: Holiday (Music) in Hell

The Onion kindly provided this Patton Oswalt demolition of the “Christmas Shoes” song. while it’s funny, it is a reminder that we have reached the time of year when radio stations across the country will begin inflicting holiday “cheer” on their listeners. which seems like an excellent subject for a poll: Which of these holiday… Continue reading Poll: Holiday (Music) in Hell

The Internet Is a Weird and Wonderful Place

Via somebody on a mailing list, Eric Whiteacre’s virtual choir: The post I got this from doesn’t contain any details, nor does it contain useful links to the making of this particular video, but looking around the top level of the blog it’s fairly clear that this was put together from a large number of… Continue reading The Internet Is a Weird and Wonderful Place

Two-Word Lyrics Quiz #7

I was up until almost midnight grading labs, and I have forty-odd grant proposals to read today, so I’m going to be unplugging from the Internet and working on, well, work. For entertainment while I’m paying for my procrastination, here’s another two-word lyrics quiz. These two-word phrases each uniquely identify a pop song (I hope).… Continue reading Two-Word Lyrics Quiz #7

Two-Word Lyrics Quiz #6

(I think that’s the right number…) I’ve got a ton of stuff to do today, and it’s the last Friday of summer, so here’s a little light entertainment. As in previous editions, each of the two-word phrases on the list below should hopefully uniquely identify one pop song. If you think you recognize the song,… Continue reading Two-Word Lyrics Quiz #6

The Importance of Distraction

Kate recently signed up for Facebook, and I was talking to her earlier about some of the options for wasting tons of time entertaining yourself with Facebook, and mentioned the ever-popular trivia quizzes and “personality tests” and the like. Of course, I had to caution her that most of the quizzes are really lame, because… Continue reading The Importance of Distraction