Mindy Smith has a new album coming out!  Stupid Love will be released by Vanguard Records on August 11th!  Youtube clips of some songs below!  Also, I’m a big fan of having a couple of songs on youtube to listen to before committing to an album.

“What Went Wrong”
2 more songs below the fold!

One of the nice things about the smaller portable music devices is that they force you to think about which songs are your favorites and why — I take this type of reflection to be a good thing.  I know that many of my readers are R.E.M. fans, so I thought I’d share my personal [...]

I have often joked that I could get a grammy award simply by angling for one of the grammy’s ridiculous categories that seems so specific that it elimintaes every other person on earth.  I can picture it now, “and the grammy for the best album recorded of songs sung by someone named Steven singing to [...]

Since it is snowing in the Twin Cities, (though it doesn’t look like the picture in the paper this far south) I am using my personal authority to declare it acceptable to listen to The Nutcracker out of season.

I just discovered what Thom Yorke’s “Harrowdown Hill” is about: wow. 
Here’s the lyrics to the song:
Don’t walk the plank like I did
You will be dispensed with
When you’ve become inconvenient
Up on Harrowdown Hill
Where you used to go to school
Thats where I am
Thats where I’m lying down
Did I fall or was I pushed?
Did I fall or was [...]

For those in the armed services, leaders, businessmen, students, citizens intent on making and preserving the best of this world so that it may be experienced and shared as broadly as possible, I wish the very happiest Fourth of July.  I give you for the day, the Augsburg Choir from the Twin Cities singing the [...]

Before I try to sort through reactions and the import of Boumediene v. United States, I wanted to mention that I will be doing so listening to Emmylou Harris’ new CD, All I Intended to Be. You can get it for 9.99 on direct download from Amazon.  ”Gold” features Harris with Dolly Parton again (woohoo!), and “Take That Ride” [...]

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Y-XQs5iS5Q]

If one were to ask me what I think the best rock band album of all time is, I would not even give it a moment’s hesitation to come back with OK Computer by Radiohead (and I’m not alone).   The music means so much to me, for so many different reasons, and in so many [...]

Just downloaded Thom Yorke’s The Eraser.  Rolling Stone liked it.  Just started listening now.  Here are my reactions as I listen song-by-song.

1.  "The Eraser" - Discordant piano playing, this is an old Thom Yorke move by now, but it is a little less jarring in this song.   There’s something very inviting about his vocal tone [...]