CDs>Drop>TheyDon'tComeOutLikeGays

I didn't buy this because Timbo's juicin. The grammy should have an asterisk

New shit:

in a rash spending frenzy brought on by a recurring childhood trauma involving fish tacos, He-Man, and Daryl Strawberry, I copped both the new TV on the Radio and the new Yo La Tengo. TVOTR's is called Return to Cookie Mountain and its cover art looks like a sinister bird's nest or something. Kool Keith was obviously behind both decisions. It's poised to claim album of the year honors from people who still think indie rock is, like, the serious shit--just about everything I read about it when it came out in the UK a few weeks ago was slobbering helmet buff [1]. So naturally I had to have the actual cd to blast in my Altima (so that when I stop at a red light and some cornshit's blastin Timbuh (lake + land) I can yell at him: "these guys are black!") I've done all that and frankly It doesn't live up to critical hype. It is very good, but like the other TVOTR records, its is a cold, cold thing. I might be more into it if there were a few guitar solos or something, or a guest verse by Young Joc, but as it is, RTCM is a mass of grey fuzz and very high singing by the guy with the huge beard. Worth owning, but it's not like they just dropped Van Halen.

YLT's is called I'm Not Afraid of You and I Will Beat Your Ass and it looks cool. Its red and shiny and shit. Me like shiny. My dream is that people who listen to rap realize that YLT are great, even though they sometimes sound like happyfuntime music, which makes XXL cover-scowls impossible. This might never happen, unless a Best of NJ album drops, with Redman and Joe Budden trading verses over a languorous YLT baile-funk track. Man would I ever listen to that. Anyway, INAOYAIWBYA starts out with 11 minutes of guitar noise, but there's a beat behind it, so don't get your My Bloody Valentine Thong [2] in a bunch. Plus, there are 15 tracks, you're allowed to masturbate lazily on one of them. There are a couple of bangers (relatively fast songs) in here, notably "I Should Have Known Better." Currently "Stockholm Syndrome" from I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One is the most played song on my iPod, but I can see "I Should Have Known Better" overtaking it. [3]

[1] This is the same thing that happened with last year's undisputed champion, Late Registration, which was so universally and inexplicably adored by critics. I bought it, liked it for a while cuz it after has fucking beats on it, but then I realized what critics willingly ignored: that Kanye is barely a mediocre rapper. And there was all this "oh it's ok that he's so cocky cuz he backs it up!" and "Kanye was so funny on The College Dropout but now he's gonna get serious and give us some heavy messages," such as the fact that the CIA obviously makes crack and floods the ghetto with it. Then he's on the cover of Rolling Stone as Jesus and not joking AT ALL. That would have been okay only if Lil Kim was also on there as the Virgin Mary. Now I can't listen to that album and I can't look at him without being desirous of a mace with which to bludgeon him ("Through the Wire" was a good song). Rockist critics just wanted sooooooo badly to embrace a rap album and call it a break through masterpiece. Funny they chose one that's barely decent.

[2] Two references to thongs in two posts! Someone needs to switch to hot pants.

[3] I follow my most played iPod list like HR stats. "Pavement hit two more this weekend, probably played the Royals;" "That GZA song hit one the other night, man that shit has been around since Julio Franco. Ha, he hit one too. Guy's 48! I repeat, 48!"