I try to be a good, responsible human being. Some examples: I recycle. I support local and used book stores. I try to buy my fruit at a farmer’s market, but when I do go to a grocery store, I always pick out the organic fruit.

It’s this last point I’d like to discuss.

It would be easy for anyone to create a quick, common sense list of things you’d think I probably wouldn’t want to find in my fruit, or really in any of my food, ever. Let’s try.

1) Mold
2) Pesticides
3) Bugs of any kind

Pretty simple, pretty standard, pretty predictable. Not asking for much here.

Now let me show you how it’s gone the last few times I’ve bought organic raspberries.

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And so we arrive at the last day of 30-Day Song Challenge, the Sequel, which followed hot on the heels of the original Challenge – so 60 songs in slightly more than a couple of months (actually, given my cheating, it was quite a bit more than 60 songs, wasn’t it?)

I wanted to end The Sequel with a nod to the timelessness of music. As anyone with ears and even a hint of critical awareness knows, a vast majority of popular music is disposable. Some of it might hold up for a few listens, but it’s built to be more fad than trend (or even fashion). Hear today, gong tomorrow. Full story »

I really enjoyed the original 30-Day Song Challenge and my hat’s off to whoever created it. But it seemed a little obvious to me in places, so when I set out to create the sequel I wanted to tackle some ideas that we may not think about as often as we might. Today, one of the big ones.

We here in the US think of rock and roll as something that’s pretty much American and British, with perhaps a bit of Canadian and Aussie thrown in. In other words, Anglo. Full story »

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In 1976, I was a general-assignment reporter of limited experience and minimal accomplishment. So my editor kindly fired me, then said: “Now get your ass up on the copy desk where you belong.”

I knew little about copy editing. So I asked my newsroom godfather: “Neil, what do copy editors do?”

He looked over the rims of those 1950s spectacles he favored and said, “Defend your reader.”

“Against what?” I asked.

“Error,” he said. “Any error possible.”

The memory of, or, perhaps, even the desire to exercise that dictum may remain in today’s newsrooms. But the ability of copy editors today to defend readers against error has inexorably been eroded. That decimation of editing capacity has been fueled by computerization beginning in the late ’70s and continued in this past decade by the sacking of newsroom staffs and the insatiable demand of management to get stories online or winging to mobile devices right now.
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The American econo-political system has always been a dangerous proposition, an egg balanced on a knife blade six feet above a concrete floor.

Sure, most countries have elements of the American solution. Many countries now have peaceful exchanges of power decided by voters. Most Western nations have pretty strong protections for individual rights, and in many cases, those are stronger than our Bill of Rights. Most have moved away from centrally planned economies.

But we were the ones who first put it all together. Just as Alfred Nobel figured out how to mix volatile nitroglycerine with diatomaceous earth to create the equally powerful but more stable explosive dynamite, the Founders managed to take an inherently dangerous set of ideas and make them stable. You need only look at the French Revolution to see what can happen when those same ideas are dropped on a concrete floor. Full story »

I seem to discover lots of news bands that I like every year, and since this particular day of the challenge doesn’t ask me to pick my favorite – just a band I like – let’s keep it simple and pick one without overthinking it. Because if I start thinking about this one I’ll be here all night.

Two-Door Cinema Club is one of my favorite finds of the past couple of years. Crisp, smart indie pop that owes a great deal to the late ’70s New Wave and bands like XTC and Haircut 100 (although when they’re asked about their influences they don’t really talk about New Wave). Love this one. Full story »

The US soccer team just dropped a 2-1 decision to Panama in the second group stage match of the 2011 Gold Cup. To say the game was frustrating to watch is to understate the case, and with some panache.

Despite an appalling first half, the Americans certainly had their chances to draw even and win the game late, capped by sub Steve Wondolowski swallowing his tongue and club-footing what amounted to a layup attempt into the third deck at the 80:00 mark. Full story »

It seems that America now officially believes in torture as a primary tool of investigation. And back in 2008, I did a little story on how, believe it or not, we are using music as an implement of torture. So I suppose today’s challenge has a dark side, huh?

Mercifully for those suspected terrorists in captivity, DJ EIT (Enhanced Interrogation Techniques) lacks imagination (although, +1 for the “Barney Theme Song” and Meow Mix jingle). Still, nothing at all from the Disco era? Full story »

Each year I write my annual Best CDs series and along the way I usually have an article or two about some of the bands that turn up on that list. Today I want to acknowledge a few of the year’s best releases to date. This isn’t comprehensive, by any stretch, but if you’re looking for some new tunes to explore on a beautiful June weekend, here’s a place to start.

Up first, hot off last night’s appearance in the Big Apple, Doco does “Cocoa Beach Blues” live on 11 O’Clock Rock. The new disc is entitled Stereo Chemistry.

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I have this rule–it’s not really mine, it’s from some columnist and I just can’t for the life of me remember who it is, but I owe him or her a huge debt of gratitude–to resolutely not read any stories that have the words “Sarah” and “Palin” in the headline. It’s proved to be a remarkably good rule. It saves me a lot of time, and generally keeps me in a better mood. It turns out to be very adaptable too. It works just as well with the words “Cheryl Cole,” or “Donald Trump,” or “Newt Gingrich.”

But when I saw a story with the words “Sarah Palin” and “Margaret Thatcher” in the same headline, I had to break the rule. How could I not? Sarah wanted to drop in say hello to Margaret when she visits London next month. Why she’s visiting London remains a mystery to me, and that’s just fine. But then it turned out that it just wasn’t going to happen. Full story »

We’re going in a slightly different direction today. I mean, for a variety of artistic and intellectual reasons I’d love to have dinner with the greatest bands ever – The Fabs, The Stones, The Who, Zep, Floyd, U2, REM, Van Morrison, and a bunch of others. Then there’s this class of really cool, past and present indie artists from then and now, like Jeff Foster and Don Dixon and The Lost Patrol and Jag Star and Paul Lewis and Fiction 8 and Space Team Electra, but I have had dinner with some of them (and have reasonable expectations of dining with the rest of them some day).

But today, I’m thinking about personal realities. Full story »

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From the “The Feds Are The Last To Know Department”:

The Federal Communications Commission released a study today reporting that an “explosion of online news sources in recent years has not produced a corresponding increase in reporting, particularly quality local reporting …” The study, titled “Information Needs of Communities” takes a broad but somewhat shallow look at the media landscape. It reads as more of a history of how modern media arrived at its current state than as a clear, practical recipe for change.

The study — which looks at the local reporting performance of all media, not just that of newspapers — was undertaken by senior FCC adviser Steven Waldman, a former journalist for Newsweek and U.S. News and World Report. According to his study:

In many communities, we now face a shortage of local, professional, accountability reporting. The independent watchdog function that the Founding Fathers envisioned for journalism — going so far as to call it crucial to a healthy democracy — is in some cases at risk at the local level.

Well, duh. Full story »

Okay, this is brilliant. I never heard of it until this morning and now I learn that there’s apparently a whole movement afoot, with a project and everything.

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Commenting on Thomas Lowenthal’s original article at ArsTechnica on Bitcoin and the dangers involved in introducing a new currency.

The closest parallel to a pure digital currency play is the travails of paper money. Coinage is at least based on the value of the coin making up the face value. Paper money has no such associations which is why the gold bugs still want to return to the standard.

Money is only valuable when backed by a government that can use sufficient force to ensure that it will be used for all trade, debts and promissory notes. When a person asks, “You and what army?” a government can easily respond. Full story »