On January 16, 2008, Dr. James Hansen of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Sciences (GISS) released the summation of temperature data for 2007 with apparently very little fanfare. Given the data collected by Dr. Hansen, the lack of fanfare itself might well be notable. But regardless, the data itself bears more public attention that it’s had.

2007 is now tied with 1998 as the second hottest year for global temperature in a century. Full story »

Idiots.

Jonathan Walton puts it this way:

I confess that I find this somewhat tragic, as I too have Southern pride. Full story »

This starts with Nick Drake. I wrote a piece about the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductions and during the course of that piece bemoaned the Hall’s selection of Leonard Cohen when artists whom I felt were more deserving, such as Drake, were routinely ignored.

That got me thinking about Drake and I spent much of yesterday afternoon listening to his work to verify my claims of his artistic worthiness. Listening to Nick Drake, who died tragically young after having completed only three record albums, (yes, I know “record album” is an archaic term, but until we have a better one to describe a set of songs meant by the artist to be heard as a unified group, it’ll have to do) got me to thinking about our tendency to elevate artists who die young to a status of respect and admiration (even iconic devotion) above what their actual work justifies. Full story »

Tim Karr has an important read for music lovers up at HuffPo. In it, he covers OK Go’s descent into Washington to promote the importance of Net Neutrality to independent musicians.

The band’s success is a testament to an open Internet. OK Go was propelled to national fame via the popularity of their YouTube videos. One, a treadmill dance along to the song “Here It Goes Again,” has been viewed more than 31 million times.

“If people wonder whether the music industry will benefit from Net Neutrality they can look no further than us,” said OK Go’s lead singer and guitarist Damian Kulash in testimony before the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday.

“There really is some consensus here that Net Neutrality is good for music and good for musicians… I’m here to ask you today to preserve Net Neutrality and the openness of the Internet. I believe it’s critical to the future of music.”

These days, when it seems like the deck is as thoroughly stacked against legitimate artists as it has ever been, it’s a little scary to imagine what happens if we take away one of the few tools left to bands trying to promote themselves. Full story »

Oops. Sorry. I forgot this isn’t The Onion for a moment.

But when you look at this list, you can see why this wouldn’t necessarily be a shocker….

We now return you to normal programming….