Prophet's picture

    Top Ten Albums of '08 - Numbers 6, 5 and 4

    Well, I believe I've managed to achieve the slowest roll-out of a top ten list.  You know you're in bad shape when you start before everyone else and you're still on number 7 come Christmas.

    Therefore, we're going to speed this up a bit.  Here are my choices for numbers 6, 5, and 4.  (3, 2, and 1 to come)

    Prophet's picture

    Top Ten Albums of '08 - Number 7

    7. Girl Talk - Feed the Animals

    A relative of mine admitted recently that even though he loved the new Girl Talk album, he couldn't help but think of it as cheating.

    Ed or Thom

    While living in suburban D.C., I decided to enter the progressive talk radio business in large part because of two hosts - Stephanie Miller and Ed Schultz. I heard both in early 2004 on WWRC a weak station transmitting from Silver Spring, MD. Stephanie is humorous and has a sidekick who does great impressions - sometimes the two are almost as funny as Howard Stern on an average day - plus she is timely, topical, liberal, and doesn't leave me with that queasy feeling and slightly dirty sheen that Stern usually did. Schultz has a great voice - better than Limbaugh's.

    Deadman's picture

    Questions: The Ipod Shuffle Edition ...

    Partly inspired by Prophet and his ongoing top 10 albums of 2008 series, and partly because I'm otherwise uninspired, I've decided to take a different tact for this week's questions: I am going to press shuffle on my IPod Nano and create a question somehow related to each of the first 10 songs that come up. I will also be giving some very quick commentary on the songs.

    I am uncertain how well this process will lend itself to thought-provoking questions, and I will certainly be risking great personal embarrassment by exposing my music collection to the dagworld at large.

    Series: 
    Prophet's picture

    Top Ten Albums of '08 - Number 9

    9. Neon Neon - Stainless Steel

    I'm sorry but any outfit who can put out an album that sounds like the music I listened to when I was 8, and make it sound pretty fantastic along the way, deserves to be in the top 10 in this very down year for music.

    Prophet's picture

    Top Ten Albums of '08 - Number 10

    We'll be working our way from 10 down to one. 

    Oh, by the way, just to introduce myself - I'm prophet and I know the future.

    Moving on...

    10. Vampire Weekend - Vampire Weekend

    Orlando's picture

    What are you reading?

    I love books. And I love talking about books--more than politics. Actually, WAY more than politics.

    Right now, I'm reading Loving Frank, by Nancy Horan. It's a fictionalized version of a love affair that Frank Lloyd Wright had with a woman he designed a house for. So far, I like it and I especially like that it happened in Oak Park, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago where Wright designed many houses. I'm not far enough into it yet to say much more than that.

    Deadman's picture

    MOFT: Episode 1

    Welcome to the first installment of My One Favorite Thing. This will be a regular (maybe weekly) post on the one thing I'm really digging at the moment. It could be a game or activity, an album or song, a movie or TV show, a person, a food, or just about anything at all.

    Michael Wolraich's picture

    Review: Slumdog Millionaire - City of Bollywood

    City of God (2002) tells the story of a good kid from the teeming slums of Rio who struggles to escape the gravitational pull of poverty, crime, and prejudice in quest of love and a better life. Slumdog Millionaire tells the story of a good kid from the teeming slums of Bombay/Mumbai who struggles to escape the gravitational pull of poverty, crime, and prejudice in quest of love and a better life. Thus, a genre is born.

    Orlando's picture

    Review: Teen Angst in the Twilight

    Vampires. They fascinate us. Whether it's Bram Stoker, Ann Rice, Josh Whedon or Elisabeth Kostova, writers keep finding ways to make the same old stories compelling, and we flock to bookstores and movie theaters or set our Tivos so we don't miss one gruesome detail.

    Michael Wolraich's picture

    Music: Secret Machines - Wounded Eagle or Lame Duck?

    The Secret Machines just haven't been the same since Ben Curtis, one half of the fraternal duo, left to focus on his own band, School of Seven Bells. The unsettling but electrifying harmony between Ben and Brandon Curtis could send a current through the back of your head. Imagine Geddy Lee and Robert Plant on stage together like Simon and Garfunkel gone bad.

    Michael Wolraich's picture

    Blaming the Blackout

    Funny short by filmmaker Ilya Chaiken, set during the great power outage of '03. It was a bizarre moment in New York. The city stopped for almost 24 hours, depending on where you lived. People couldn't get up to their high-rise apartments or hotel rooms. I had a date scheduled that night, but with the mobile network down, I couldn't reach her, so I went to find a friend of mine instead. I had to creep up a dark stairwell, using my cell phone as a flashlight, to leave a note on her door.

    Michael Wolraich's picture

    Film Review: W.

    I tend to avoid political cinema because it's usually unbalanced and heavy-handed, and the art inevitably suffers from the attempt to communicate an unambiguous message. But W. received some decent reviews, has been a box office success, and concerns a subject dear to my heart. I should have stuck to my principles. The best thing about the experience of watching it was the half-hour nap I slipped in between Dubya's decision to invade Iraq because of the alleged WMD's and his shocked realization that there were no WMD's in Iraq.

    Michael Wolraich's picture

    Art Review: theanyspacewhatever at the Guggenheim, New York

    When you enter the Guggenheim from now until January 7th, the first thing you will notice is a blindingly gaudy marquee seemingly hung over the entrance by glowing blue chains. Frank Lloyd Wright was not available for comment at the time this article was written, but there were reports of muffled banging heard in the vicinity of his gravesite. The marquee was designed by artist Philippe Parreno. It's a fitting introduction to the Guggenheim's new exhibition, theanyspacewhatever, for three reasons:

    Michael Wolraich's picture

    We Are the Ones Project

    In these dark days of negative politics and collapsing markets, I just want to call out a feel-good art project to warm our chilly hearts. A few of us associated with DagBlog organized a nationwide Obama fundraiser over the summer with fundraising parties in multiple cities across the country and around the world. I worked on the NYC event which took place at a loft in Brooklyn.

    Deadman's picture

    'Hair' yesterday, gone today ...

    Saw the play 'Hair' in Central Park this past weekend.

    Damn, it's a shame I missed the Sixties.

    The outfits were funky and colorful and sexy. The music was danceable and uplifting. The drugs were mostly harmless, more about expanding the mind than escaping reality. And the whole free love thing, well, that seemed pretty groovy too.

    Deadman's picture

    If Obama was an alien, that would explain a lot ...

    So last Tuesday Larry King interviews Barack Obama and then three days later, he does a show debating the existence of UFOs. It's fucking nutty. (King, who i just found out has done these shows for years, apparently wants to be the first broadcaster to interview an alien).

    Deadman's picture

    Positively posthumous ...

    My mom's mom was far from the best person in the world (This is not the grandmother I discussed a couple weeks ago). She held grudges and often spoke ill of others, including family. She was racist. She belittled and insulted my grandfather, only becoming the dutiful, loving wife after he had a massive stroke and lacked the capacity to resist her will.

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