I was floored when I heard a critic on Fresh Air say that Phantom Thread was the best movie score he ever hear.

Saw Downsizing last night at a new/restored theater in the same city that some of the scenes were filmed. Now, I’m doing everything in my power to get my stuff cooked/made for the New Year’s thing tonight so I can plop down and savor a few more hours of Breath of the Wild (got a Nintendo Switch for Christmas).

In terms of being a “tastemaker,” I think the worst burden of indie rock is that overall, it’s way overstayed its welcome (in terms of the proportion of album sales vs. press write-ups). The “grunge” revolution lasted only three years, whereas the “indie” genre (which is about as helpful and vague as “alternative”)…

God yes. I thought that would be a no-brainer. It’s not as artistic as last year’s “Fish out of Water,” but good lord, in terms of brutal honesty, I didn’t find anything else on TV that touched it this year.

I finished Stephen King’s It, and just found out I got first dibs on Anthony Decurtis’ book on Lou Reed, so while I wait for that to get in the mail, I decided to read Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird. I remember hating this book in the 8th grade, and not reading past the first few chapters, mainly because I hated…

Now that my “best of 2017" assignments are done, I can go back to my ‘listen to each album/download/CD I’ve acquired at least two times’ initiative. This week was pretty light:

So long as there’s an omission of Mark Lanegan’s Gargoyle, I’m going to keep advocating for its inclusion.

I put money down for the Switch, but I won’t get it until after Christmas, so I’m looking forward to both Mario Odyssey and Zelda. But in the meantime, I feel like an utter dumbass, because there were a few puzzles in Rime that had me going in circles for the better part of two hours. It was worth it though for the…

Great post. I bought the Switch for Christmas for myself - not opening it until Christmas - looking forward to a great “winter killer” of a game.

Destroyer albums have a way of sneaking up on you (not ‘you’ you, just in general - as a listener - the ones who buy Destroyer albums)

So, I hit ‘load more comments’ for about 35 times (love this new system!) - and no ‘best of’ list for Apples yet. Are you a ‘wait until Dec 31st’ purist, or can we expect a forthcoming Top 10 list?

The Slowdive album was amazing

1. Mark Lanegan Band - Gargoyle, 2. Slowdive - s/t, 3. Run the Jewels - RTJ III (I’m going on the day it was physically released, 4. Perfume Genius - No Shape 5. Kendrick Lamar - DAMN, 6. Steve Earle - So You Wanna Be An Outlaw, 7. The War on Drugs - A Deeper Understanding, 8. Mavis Staples - If All I Was Was Black,…

And yet, he got $25 mill a year to do it, while most “true” journalists usually get priced out of the market because they can’t live on $36,000 a year.

I think with Pop, it was pretty much the industry scaring u2 into not taking any more risks. It was at the point where the “industry” (fickle fans, label heads) said “ok, you’ve had enough fun being ironic and experimental and shit. Now, get back to what you do best, but put a nice new millennial ‘spin’ on it.”

For this week - continuing to listen to a few from last week:

Matt, you were doing so good until you got to the “Some of what is being said about me is untrue or mischaracterized” sentence (the fourth sentence in your apology). Even if it is true, c’mon, you’re a journalist. You’ve seen these apologies before - wait until later to address the inaccurate ones, or even false ones,…

I don’t know...I’ve always been the type to prefer someone like Jarvis Cocker’s anti-love bitchiness.

As well you should.

The more u2 releases stuff like this, the more I absolutely love Zooropa (Achtung Baby is still my favorite). Pop was a misfire, but at least they were still challenging themselves. All That You Can’t Leave Behind was when my love affair of u2 ended. It’s not a particularly bad album. But it was one of those times…