Weekly Roundup

Slow week this week. Ah well!

Celebrity related quote of the week: “‘The United States first destroyed our great country, the Soviet Union, then they destroyed our economy and now they are sending this horrible young woman to destroy our souls,’ said Myasoyedova, interviewed during a recent rally of about 100 demonstrators organized by the Orthodox Standard Bearers Union, a group combining religion and nationalism.” –David Holley, LA Times

What young woman is this candid Russian speaking of? Why, Madonna, of course. Even though Madonna hasn’t seen “young” since the other side of the 90s. Mr. Myasoyedova, it could be worse than Madonna. I promise. For instance, they could be sending Clay Aiken. At least Madonna does her own songs.

The Catbirdseat’s cheat sheet for the best new albums of 2006. Indie darlings all round! Looky there at Swan Lake, riding the wave of its hype like a demented surfer, probably one that’s wearing a polo shirt and pegged jeans and a fleece wristband.

Flagpole reviews the new REM retrospective disc/dvd. So what’re your favorite REM albums? My top five are 1) Document; 2) Automatic For the People; 3) Green; 4) Out of Time; and 5) Monster.

EW profiles their 50 best high school movies, but they totally left off my top two. My top five would have gone, 1) Better Off Dead; 2) Pump Up the Volume; 3) Heathers; 4) Sixteen Candles; and 5) 10 Things I Hate About You or Clueless. Why yes, I’m just a big old cynical softie, why do you ask?

Via BrianPalmer, How to make a Zach Braff movie in 10 steps. Ahaha. Poor Zach Braff. Make one indie-lovers movie and you’re worshipped, but make two, and you’re pilloried. Welcome to the fickle world of indiedom.

At I Am Fuel, some old, lost Bob Dylan recordings. I don’t know where Heather gets this stuff, but she just out-awesomes herself every week.

At Rewriteable Content, a back to school love song mix. Ew, school.

The Rawking Refuses To Stop! talks about the Ryan Adams / Neko Case / Willie Nelson show at the Hollywood Bowl. I sure would have loved to see Ryan & Neko, if the venue were smaller and I had the energy to fight traffic out to the Bowl.

Useful Thing of the Year: the HYMN project introduces MyFairTunes 6, which will unencode your iTunes-purchased music so that it can be converted to mp3. I can’t vouch for it completely, because when I gave it a try it worked for “Jaan Pehechaan Ho” but not for “Burn.” *shrug* Who knows.

Via Neil Gaiman and Billboard, I learn of a 43-song CD of sea chanties sung by contemporary artists. Yay! I love sea chanties, even though I can’t even go out in a boat without barfing over the side. Heh.

And last but not least, New Contrast Podcast – entrance music for a film.