Bruce Springsteen covers himself (American Skin), covers himself covering Tim Scott (High Hopes), covers himself covering Suicide (Dream Baby Dream) and covers himself covering Rage Against the Machine covering himself (Ghost of Tom Joad). This one has "fulfilling that bloated record deal with Sony" written all over…

If your "muse" inspires you to put out an album of covers, recordings of live songs played hundreds of times, and items from the vault that sound like they are from various sessions from the last 12 years, with nothing groundbreaking in the bunch, it's time to get a new muse. I still mostly enjoy this, though.

This is better than Working on a Dream, I think. Not high praise. But if "Frankie Fell In Love" was on that record instead of the embarrassing "Queen of the Supermarket", it would have elevated it by itself.

I'll disagree and say that Magic is a record that will stand the test of time. Just a solid rock record. "Gypsy Biker" and "Long Walk Home" are tremendous. "Girls in Their Summer Clothes" and "Your Own Worst Enemy" grew on me big time. There's nothing egregiously bad on the album, even if it is a bit melodramatic/over…

Good to have the show back and all, but really I didn't laugh much. Perd was great, the Weiner line was good, and I always crack up at Chris Traeger's enthusiasm and Jean-Ralphio in general. But I really noticed myself not laughing for most of this episode.

Party Down
In the Aeroplane Over the Sea
Black Dynamite
A.C. Newman's Get Guilty

And my vote for song of the year is Isbell's "Relatively Easy". I'm hoping to catch him this weekend in Fort Lauderdale.