10 Awesome Scenes From Arrested Development
The Office still has its moments. Modern Family shows some promise. And 30 Rock is coming back in October. But since it went off the air in 2006, no sitcom has made me laugh as much as Arrested Development. The movie may or may not happen sometime before Michael Cera starts getting adult roles, but we'll always have these three perfect seasons. And right now we've got two of them on Hulu. Here are 10 clips to help explain our obsession with this show.... read more
Download Dierks Bentley's "Beautiful World"
Download Dierks Bentley's "Beautiful World" here.Bentley's Feel That Fire is out now.... read more
Glory Days: Dispatches From an Academic Conference on Bruce Springsteen (Part 3)
The thing about attending conferences when such a diversity of smart people are speaking is choosing which sessions to go to. It works like this: First, you have your general sessions which everyone attends and are usually led by a high-profile participant or guest. Then, you disperse into these breakout sessions based on predetermined rubrics (which is really just a fancypants college word for "themes"). Which means there is a great cross-section of people saying interesting things from a variety of experiences, but you miss 90 percent of it. It’s an embarrassment of riches.... read more
Phoenix - New York, NY - Central Park SummerStage - 9/26/09
Photos taken by Sean Edgar at Summerstage... read more
Glory Days: Dispatches From an Academic Conference on Bruce Springsteen (Part 2)
I took a walk late Friday night along the boardwalk in Asbury Park. It’s been almost seven years since I was last here, and things have certainly changed. Most of the Glory Days conference attendees, at least the ones who can still stay up this late, were listening to Gary U.S. Bonds at the Stone Pony.... read more
The 10 Worst Movie Accents of All Time
Casting a famous actor in a role can be a crapshoot. Just because a director can snag a big name for their film doesn't always mean that they belong there. Case in point, generally talented and experienced actors, when asked to do foreign accents, may stumble somewhat...or they may stumble a lot. Here, we've listed 10 of the worst examples of famous actors doing infamously bad accents:... read more
Fourteen Catchiest Apple Ads (Plus, Who's That Singing In The New Nano Commercial?)
With their clean lines, bright hues, tech-forward features and cultural cache, it often seems like Apple products simply sell themselves. But what, then, of the hundreds of equally stylish—and so often mesmerizing—television ads the company's shelled out for over the years? Are they just for our amusement? Well, no, but sometimes they might as well be. There are few other ad campaigns with the capacity to stop TV viewers in their commercial-break tracks from the sofa to the fridge, and few others worth seeking out on YouTube even after you've gone to great TiVo-related lengths to avoid them the first... read more
Seven Outrageous and Iconic David Cross Moments
They say the pen is mightier than the sword. If that's the case, David Cross's pen is mightier than a lightsaber or a railgun. The veteran stand-up comic has been using his sardonic wit to poke at society's sacred cows ever since he burst onto the L.A. comedy scene in the early '90s. Sacred or profane, it's all fair game to him. So, in honor of Cross's new book (and tour): here are but a few of his finest moments to date:... read more
Download The Fresh & Onlys' "Dude's Got a Tender Heart"
Download The Fresh & Onlys' "Dude's Got a Tender Heart" here.The Fresh & Onlys are on tour now with Thee Oh Sees, Box Elders and Dan Melchoir.... read more
Baby Clownfish (Awesome of the Day)
No, that's not the latest animal band name (though you're welcome to use it if you're more twee than these guys). They're just the latest addition into the Jackson family. Two years ago, my parents got tired of scraping algae off their 50-gallon salt-water aquarium, and I volunteered to provide their fish with a new home. Included in the deal was a pair of clownfish named (of course) Nemo and Marlin. Nemo even had a gimpy right fin. When Nemo eventually died, I bought Marlin a new buddy that my kids named (of course) Nemo. The pair seemed to get... read more
Glory Days: Dispatches From an Academic Conference on Bruce Springsteen (Part 1)
Anyone remember the first year of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductions? I think it was 1986. Pete Townsend noticed all the tuxedos everyone was wearing. “I see that rock and roll has become respectable…what a bummer!” ... read more
Poultry Emotion: A 20-Piece Bucket o' Classic Chicken Songs
In honor of golden-throated Kentucky chicken farmer Kevin Skinner, who won the million-dollar grand prize on America's Got Talent last week, we offer this squawkingly great list of songs about the animal this new pop-cultural phenomenon used to spend so much time looking after... read more
Ten Out Of Tenn Vol. III (Awesome of the Day)
For a city that's known for 10-gallon-hat country, Nashville has quietly begun to flourish this decade as a place for rock-leaning singer/songwriters. Exhibit A is the third album from Music City collective Ten Out of Tenn: Ten tracks from 10 solo artists who are doing their best to put the Nashvegas label to rest. Founder Trent Dabbs and bandleader K.S. Rhoads are the only remaining members of the original Ten Out of Tenn tour in 2005, but there's plenty of new talent on Vol. III to keep the tradition alive. Newcomers include Kyle Andrews, Andrew Belle, Madi Diaz, Mikky Ekko,... read more
The Boys are Back in Town: Goodie Mob's Reunion Show
Back before Cee-Lo graced the cover of this very magazine, way before he drove us "Crazy", there was Goodie Mob (the Good Die Mostly Over Bullshit)... read more
Top Ten Reality TV Shows
A true event of this decade, reality TV can be toxic (Wife Swap), and it can be inspiring (The Amazing Race). The shows on this list don't necessarily represent the best, most intelligent programming that television has to offer, but they’re entertaining—and isn’t that the point?... read more
Happy Birthday, Bruce Springteen! Five Videos that Show Why He's the Boss (Awesome of the Day)
It's hard to believe, but Bruce Springsteen turns 60 today. To celebrate the occasion, I've been watching some of his performances on YouTube, and here are five of my favorites. I finally saw him live earlier this year at Bonnaroo, and fully grasped the whole "Boss" thing.... read more
Download John Vanderslice's "Too Much Time (Demo)"
Download a demo version of John Vanderslice's "Too Much Time" here.Vanderslice's "Too Much Time" 7-inch will be released Oct. 6 on Dead Oceans.... read more
Random Musical Thoughts -- Dave Perkins, Apples in Stereo, The Knickerbockers, Cotton Mather, Frank Turner
-- Dave Perkins' searing album Pistol City Holiness, which I've previously written about on this blog, has been nominated for a Grammy in the Contemporary Blues category, and a song from that album, "Cherryfish and Chicken" has been nominated for a Grammy in the Rock Instrumental category. This is great news, and it would be even more fabulous if he won. Dave is a one-man music-making, marketing, and distribution company, and an all-around good guy, so it's particularly gratifying when the lofty Musical Powers That Be notice and appreciate his work. Please check out his wonderful album and spread the word.--... read more
Variations on a Meme: Six Kanye West Pics to Make You Giggle
Oh, Internet. You just give and give. You turn a fake controversy into something people really care about—in fact, you make people care so much that they use your wily technological ways to create a website like this, where they can post occasionally hilarious responses to the Kanye West/Taylor Swift imbroglio. Then we can scroll through this website and pick our favorite images for a blog post. Everybody wins! ... read more
Monsters of Folk "The Right Place" Video (Awesome of the Day)
There's something gimmicky about most super-groups, but Monsters of Folk just seems like a really stacked band. The only gimmick was the rule that only Jim James, Conor Oberst, M. Ward and Mike Mogis would play on the self-titled record, which came out today. They take turns singing and playing drums, bass, piano and guitars, and the whole thing comes across as four of our generation's greatest talents having a really good time creatively. The harmonies are unsurprisingly gorgeous, as James and Oberst show on the band's black-and-white, Airstream-and-yard-gnome-filled video for "The Right Place." You can read our interview with... read more
The 20 Best Gadgets of the Decade…
The 17 Best Romantic Comedies This Decade
The 50 Best Albums of the Decade…
The 25 Best Movie Performances of the…
The 20 Best Live Acts of the…
Kim Taylor - Days Like this
Blind Pilot - The Story I Heard
Gregory Alan Isakov - The Moon Song
B.O.B. - Put Me On
Punch Brothers - Punch Brothers at CMJ
David Bazan - Hard To Be
Anya Marina - Whatever You Like
