"But the thrust of rape culture theory is not just that these attitudes
exist in mass culture and in individuals, but that the expression of
those attitudes in mass culture has a negative affect, cumulatively or
otherwise, on individuals.  And I don't believe that that affect exists,
and if it did, that it could be…

Dischord— From your writing I sense a very casual and not thoroughly explained disbelief in feminist concepts — have you done much reading in this area? As John Sweden pointed out, rape culture's existence isn't at all contingent upon a higher incidence of rape. Indeed, such cultural influences have arguably…

One problem is that it takes scalpel precision to joke about a subject like that and not be offensive. Another problem is that idiots on both sides reduce it to a "No you can't joke about that !/Yes I can joke about that!" squabble.

That kid sure is talented…

I only wish he'd offered her a prompt to let her attempt some woozy, weaselly wiles to thwart the DUI, just a bit more rope to hang herself…

Hello Newman- you're welcome.
santos — I agree that it's hardly a terrible film, so "deeply hate" was an overstatement. I just find the premise and characters extremely cloying. When you say "hipster backlash," to me that can again imply lumping together too many groups, and we should not include the people who…

With the suggestion that departing lips have been sealed, it's hard to suppress building suspicion that the AVC ship is slowly going down. I hadn't even realized that their Minneapolis, Madison, Chicago, and Denver offices closed within the last year. http://blogs.citypages.com/…

Well, I don't think I'm that much of an exception, because there seemed to be significant critical backlash at the time…But while I'm usually averse to the H word, I think you could fairly call the people who liked it "hipsters," because its stylish navel-gazing won over a lot of fashionable but less particular…

So if I deeply hated it before I left the theater, what does that make me? 

Resolving to love both styles was my stance circa Shepherd's Dog. But he's made clear that he doesn't have equal regard for both, and only wants to sell us the layered stuff. If he can pick up enough new fans to make up for the old ones he's alienating, then more power to him, but if not, then he may want to…

I'll admit that for certain extremely repetitive songs, like Walking or Trapeze Swinger, the layering adds crucial interest. But then Big Burned Hand is an example of a recent song with great structural variety that many listeners indeed think Beam buried "like a dead hooker," especially after hearing the solo…

I appreciate the multiple facets of your giant nose and giant yacht… 

Brace yourselves. Josh's phrase "yacht-ready" perfectly describes this record. Absolutely no intimacy retained.

Actually, pretty much none of that. The whole album was streaming on NPR last week, and it's way more pop than folk. With 5 daughters to feed, I expected him to keep straying from that "bullshit" nostalgic niche, but hardly expected him to make a record that his daughters might listen to.  

joking, right?

So I clicked because it got the rare A, and then I read all this excitement but still can't surmount my usual stubborn and cynical disinterest in sci-fi premises. I'm almost never able to savor even the best examples of the genre. I did watch Primer years ago and remember being impressed, but also giving up on…

Shy, I'm not into the whole pick-favorites, rank-albums thing, but I'd listen to arguments as to why you consider any albums of his from Supper to date to be second tier, or why you consider Whaleheart heads above…

Well at least someone hasn't forgotten Kansas City, goddamit. If I had a nickel for every tour that went from Chicago straight to Denver…I could probably buy myself a shitty beer at the Record Bar. See you there 5/8, Bill.

This song has such great bones, some really nice variations with chord and tempo changes…it honestly kinda scares me to think what he might do with this in the studio.

This guy's evolution never fails to frustrate me. It's really the fault of his debut, which succeeded far too well at sounding like a ghost from the 19th century. Back then losing the modesty from Creek seemed about as imaginable as him shaving the beard. And the man-out-of-time nostalgia seemed so effortless and…