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I’m glad to see all of the really intense feedback that is going on right now . . . not. Anyway I am going to carry this out anyway. So, enjoy the list.

Best Albums of the 80s:

10) Queen – The Game
9) Metallica – Master Of Puppets
8) Billy Joel – Songs In The Attic
7) Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers – Full Moon Fever
6) Van Halen – 1984
5) Beastie Boys – License To Ill
4) ZZ Top – Eliminator
3) U2 – The Joshua Tree
2) Guns N’ Roses – Appetite For Destruction
1) AC/DC – Back In Black

There was not much debate about the 60s. The Beatles, Bob Dylan, The Who, and the early days of Led Zeppelin ruled that decade. Music really exploded in the 70s, including many different styles of music. So, I am sure there are going to me many more comments this time around. Without further a due here is my top ten albums of the 70s.

10) Grateful Dead – American Beauty
9) The Allman Brothers Band – Eat A Peach
7) The Clash – London Calling
6) Led Zeppelin – Houses Of The Holy
6) Lynyrd Skynyrd – (pronounced leh-nerd skin-nerd)
5) Neil Young – After The Goldrush
4) The Beatles – Let It Be
3) The Who – Who’s Next
2) Pink Floyd – Dark Side Of The Moon
1) Led Zeppelin – IV

Instead of studying for my advanced accounting midterm I recently spent two hours deciding what I thought were the 10 best albums of each decade since the 60s. Nothing has really been going on around this site lately and I wanted to spark some debate. We might have even done this in the past, but were going to do it again.

I decided that each week, for the next four weeks I am going to reveal one of my lists. I am going to assume that everyone thinks I am idiot and my list is totally wrong. Therefore I am going to be anticipating some good responses. Lets bring some fire back to this site people!

Top 10 Albums of the 60s:

10) The Doors – The Doors
9) The Beatles – Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
8) The Jimi Hendrix Experience – Are You Experienced?
7) The Who – Tommy
6) The Beatles – Abby Road
5) The Beach Boys – Pet Sounds
4) The Beatles – Revolver
3) Bob Dylan – Highway 61 Revisited
2) Led Zeppelin – Led Zeppelin II
1) The Beatles – Rubber Soul

i’ve come out of my cave for this sleep-deprived, coke-zero-fueled post.

vampire weekend
mgmt
yeasayer
etc etc etc

i listened to the new death cab track the other day. i thought it was “interesting.” my one seattle friend said it sounded like “phish.” she has sunken into a deep depression.

new portishead is coming out. w00t.

music i’ve liked recently:
born ruffians – they’re kind of catchy, but they’ll make you want to rip your ears off after the 20th listen.
cat power – her voice sounds like hard liquor and smoke-scarred lungs. i love it.
cadence weapon – it’s fun rap that is kind of smart, too. he also used to write for pitchfork and stylus. that strikes me as strange.

two of my favorite releases of this year are city and colour and british sea power.

books and stuff:
middlesex – it’s super epic and lyrical and has more period detail than your favorite keira knightley flick.
only revolutions – whaattttt?
clarissa – yawn. i appreciate some of the irony, but i think i just hate the epistolary form.
king lear – i finally read this. it’s so money.

short fiction, the art form:
tc boyle, all the time
aryn kyle
stellar kim
lauren groff

Dave Ghrol is the man. I mean besides being almost as cool as me he plays in one of the best rock bands around and plays a hell of show. Last Friday the Foo Fighters rocked the Binghamton Events Center with echoes, silence, patience, and grace. Before I get into the thick of things I want to talk a bit about the openers of the show. Against Me! took the stage first and I have to say I was pleasantly surprised. They have the sound of a punk band, but their lyrics were the opposite. They played a cool set and I give them my stamp of approval. Serj Tankian took the stage after them and was equally as impressive. He was dressed in a white blazer and white top hat and pulled some pretty nice dance moves. For the most part he stuck to what is on his new album. There were a decent amount of people that seemed to have come out just for him but I don’t think he got the crowd reaction he deserved. It really is too bad that System of a Down has called it quits for the long haul, but Serj is doing a pretty solid job on his own.

The Foo Fighters opened their set “Let It Die” and it was immediately followed by “The Pretender.” It was actually really cool watching the show open with a song that has a calm beginning and a thunderous conclusion like “Let It Die.” Then followed some old staples like “Times Like These” “Breakout” and “This is a Call.” At many points throughout the show Dave stopped to address the crowd. He lectured everyone to stay in school because he himself was a high school dropout. He then cautioned everyone to drink their milk, brush your teeth three times a day and learn to fly, which of course was a lead in to “Learn To Fly.” Then came some acoustic stuff, which included “Skin & Bones” “Marigold” “My Hero” and “Cold Day In The Sun.” Somewhere in between all that Dave stopped to thank everyone for coming out even though the weather sucked and claimed that the crowd was awesome and they were going to have to come back in the near future. He also claimed that they were staying at the Holiday Inn across the street in room 7, which I thought was pretty funny. Anyway, the show concluded with Dave playing the beginning of “Everlong” electric style by himself and then being joined by the band towards the end. “Monkey Wrench” then closed the show out and “All My Life” was the one song encore. Apparently the rumor going around is that Dave was losing his voice and that’s why the encore was cut short. Songs like “Best of You” “Big Me” and Long Road to Ruin” were not played even though they were earlier in the week at MSG. Besides that I was thrilled with the show. This was the first show since the Green Day show that I can say I really enjoyed. The Foo Fighters are awesome and everyone needs to go see them if they haven’t.

The new music for 2008 is looking decent. I mean Weezer is coming out with their sixth album. The Black Crowes are making a return. The Kooks, Coldplay, My Morning Jacket, The Raconteurs, Oasis, and Metallica all have new releases scheduled for this coming year. However, the first album I am going to review this year is from a band you might not have heard of, The Whigs. “Mission Control” is The Whigs second album, but their first studio recorded album. Their first album was actually recorded in the basement of their college house. Maybe I should start writing songs; I mean I only have three months left in my house. Anyway, The Whigs have a garage band sound with a little southern influence thrown in. They are pretty similar to the Kings Of Leon with a little more funk thrown in. The lead single off the album is “Right Hand Over My Heart” and I really love the song. However, I think there are many better tracks on the album. The bass line in the second track, “Production City” is addicting. “Hot Bed” features a lead acoustic guitar that will make you want to stomp your feet. The opener, “Like A Vibration” isn’t musically intricate, but the lyrics are cool and the driving guitar will make it a fun listen. Finally “Mission Control,” the last track, is a nice slow down and cool way to close out the album. Overall I really enjoyed this album. Although it is a little brief, I think it works out for the best. Cramming some mediocre songs in there would not have done any justice. I am going to go ahead and give “Mission Control” by The Whigs a 7.

While 2007 was a giant year of crap, lets see if I can at least make Top 5 lists.

Music
1) Say Anything – In Defense Of The Genre
~ Only album of 2007 that I can hands down say I loved. While I am not a double album fan, I have to give props to a double album from an “emo” band.

2) The Fall Of Troy – Manipulator
~Not nearly as good as Doppleganger, but Thomas Erakis one of the most fascinating guitarists I have heard in a while, and he’s only 22! Now you can be him on Guitar Hero III!

3) Coheed and Cambria – Good Apollo, I’m Burning Star IV, Volume Two: No World for Tomorrow
~A tearful goodbye from one of my favorite bands

4) Kanye West – Graduation
~Kanye is just a cut above the rest in pop sensibility amongst hip hop artists.

5) The Hives – The Black and White Album
~You can’t listen to a Hives album and not have the best time of your life

Garbage of 2007: The White Stripes – Icky Thump, Radiohead – In Rainbows

Movies
1) Superbad
~Name one movie about high school kids that is so brutally honest. I dare you. It also doesn’t hurt that there are maybe a grand total of 10 minutes in the movie where you are not laughing hysterically.

2) The Savages
~ Philip Seymour Hoffman + Laura Linney = Makes any list I will ever have.

3) The Lives Of Others
~ Technically a 2006 film, but it was released in America this year. If I made a very serious list, this would probably be 1.

4) There Will Be Blood
~PTA has returned.

5) Enchanted
~I don’t care what you think. 2007 had so many bad movies. I saw this with my 3 year old siblings and I honestly enjoyed it more than most of the crap I had seen all year.

Garbage of 2007: Juno, Atonement, No Country For Old Men, Ratatouille, Grindhouse

Once again, I’ve compiled my list of favorite albums from 2007. Unlike last year (and the previous year(s)), there were actually several albums in the running for my theoretically coveted top spot, and I didn’t just arbitrarily choose to single out an album I enjoyed. In the end, I made like Paste and decided on The National in all their atmospheric moodiness.

Originally, I was going to write up a short blurb for each release, but since I have no time to do stuff like that, I didn’t. This list represents music I actually heard. There are a bunch of other 2007 albums that I didn’t quite absorb, but with a few more listens, I’m sure some of them would have made this list, whether cracking the top 25 or necessitating a longer list. Instead, they’re in the honorable mentions section.

1. The National – Boxer
2. The White Stripes – Icky Thump
3. Okkervil River – The Stage Names
4. Les Savy Fav – Let’s Stay Friends
5. Wilco – Sky Blue Sky
6. Patrick Wolf – The Magic Position
7. Battles – Mirrored
8. 65daysofstatic – The Destruction Of Small Ideas
9. Interpol – Our Love To Admire
10. Spoon – Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
11. LCD Soundsystem – Sound Of Silver
12. Arcade Fire – Neon Bible
13. Sunset Rubdown – Random Spirit Lover
14. Jens Lekman – Night Falls Over Kortedala
15. Marissa Nadler – Songs III: Bird On The Water
16. Feist – The Reminder
17. God Is an Astronaut – Far From Refuge
18. Raising the Fawn – Sleight Of Hand
19. Maritime – Heresy And The Hotel
20. Radiohead – In Rainbows
21. Laura Veirs – The Saltbreakers
22. Great Lake Swimmers – Ongiara
23. White Rabbits – Fort Nightly
24. Of Montreal – Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer?
25. Blonde Redhead – 23

Honorable mentions (these albums were dec(ent)):
Iron and Wine, Justice, Minus the Bear, Pinback, A Place to Bury Strangers, Frog Eyes, Klaxons, Black Lips, Band of Horses, Warm in the Wake, Mancino, The Subjects, Arctic Monkeys, Apples in Stereo, Clinic, Eluvium, Do Make Say Think, Explosions in the Sky, Pelican, The Go! Team, Besnard Lakes

Five things I just don’t get:
1. M.I.A. – Kala
2. Panda Bear – Person Pitch
3. Animal Collective – Strawberry Jam
4. Burial – Untrue
5. The Field – From Here We Go To Sublime

My ten big disappointments:
1. Voxtrot – Voxtrot
2. Arcade Fire – Neon Bible
3. The Shins – Wincing The Night Away
4. Radiohead – In Rainbows
5. Stars – In Our Bedroom After The War
6. Rilo Kiley – Under The Blacklight
7. Straylight Run – The Needles, The Space
8. Clap Your Hands Say Yeah – Some Loud Thunder
9. Modest Mouse – We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank
10. Ted Leo – Living With The Living

That’s all.

My first night back in Binghamton ended with a drunken escapade, but before that I went to see Cloverfield with a couple of my friends. I am sure most of you have heard about this movie and how scary it is. I am going to tell you that it is not that scary at all. In fact it’s funny. The movie is done in a Blair Witch style with one guy (Hud) videotaping a group of friends in Manhattan giving a send off to this dude Rob, who is taking a job in Japan. I took me a while to get used to the screen jumping all around and I got pretty bad motion sickness, but I got used to it. Anyway, events go terribly wrong and a monster attacks the city. Basically the plot of the movie is that Rob has a fight with this girl Beth over a night they spent together in the past. Beth leaves the party before the monster attacks. When Rob gets a call that from her he decides he is going to stay in the city and go save her. His stupid friends decide to accompany him along the way. Like I said, Hud, is the character that films the movie. Without him this movie would have suffered a lot. Although he is almost never on camera, he makes hilarious remarks that had me falling off my seating laughing when some pretty scary shit was going down.

It is really hard to talk about this movie without revealing some theories and in particular where the monster came from. So, if you don’t want me to spoil the movie, then I would stop reading right about now. The plot of the movie was an interesting look and a small group and their struggles. However, you never hear about the monster, how it came to be, why it was destroying the city, and whether it dies. The first thing I want to cover is that the monster does not die. At the end of the credits you hear someone on a crackled walkie-talkie and you can hear him mumble in fear “it’s still alive.” Thus making it very possible that a second movie is coming, but I could also see no sequel occurring simply to keep the ambiguity of this movie alive. Now before I even went to see the movie I watched the viral marketing thing with a new clip of an oilrig sinking off the coast of Connecticut. If you watch closely at the end you can see something in the water, at which point I knew this was going to be a Godzilla type movie. Now how did this monster come to be? If you look closely at the very end of the movie there is a short clip of Rob and Beth in the past on a ferris wheel at Coney Island. In the background something shoot across the sky and lands in the water. Thus establishing my theory that the monster is extraterrestrial.

I loved how this movie left you hanging and searching for answer. I mean they must be making so much money off this thing. Everyone is running home and going on the web to find they’re own answers. I found my answer and I hope that someday we will all get clarification. This was easily one of the best movies I have seen all year. If you have a chance to go see it don’t pass it up. I give Cloverfield two thumbs up.

Suffering defeat at the hands of your arch rival stings more then you could believe when it seemed destined to be the season. The Dallas Cowboys took a step forward this season, but ultimately failed, just like 31 other teams will. A strong showing in the regular season (13 – 3 to be exact) will go down in the record books as the best season a Dallas Cowboys team has ever had, but there won’t be any trophy to back it up. It has now been eleven years since the Cowboys have won a playoff game and this was the first time since 1994 that the number one seed did not win their divisional round game. It is way to easy to point fingers . . . Patrick Crayton dropped a third down pass that could have demoralized the Giants, he also snapped of a route that could have been a touchdown . . . the coverage on special teams was horrendous . . . Leonard Davis took the steam out of an outstanding drive with a personal foul penalty . . . Tony Romo lost his cool with the referees’ incompetencies . . . Jason Garret didn’t adjust his play calls when the Giants started blitzing . . . ultimately this team lost to a team that didn’t deserve to be where they are. Self-destruction of a championship team is at fault and it surely will be a long, painful off-season.

There are so many questions running through my mind at this moment. Is Tony Romo a choke artist in the making? Is Terrell Owens going to blow up? Where is the discipline on this highly penalized team? Is Wade Phillips capable of winning a playoff game? How soon will it be before Tony Sparano is introduced as the Dolphins head coach? Is Jason Garret going to leave the Cowboys too? Are there really any glaring holes that need to be addressed before we can win the Super Bowl? Who isn’t going to be around next year? I want to answer all of these questions, for my own sanity.

Tony Romo is one of the top five quarterbacks in this league. Eli Manning is not. Tony is going to be the quarterback of this team for a long time. I find a lot of problems in calling him a choker. He led so many comeback wins throughout the regular season. This was also the first time that he was the starting quarterback for a whole season. Next year he will have a better idea of how long a haul a season can be. A nasty start like the Cowboys had this year is nice, but it is the team and quarterback that is the hottest at the end of the year that is going to win the whole thing. Tony is way too confident of a guy to let something like this get to him. I know we were having this same discussion at the end of last year, but Tony is young and he will be just fine.

The Terrell Owens saga took a back seat at the end of this season. He hurt his ankle, but he showed up for all the games that mattered and he had one hell of a season. I have to say that this all wouldn’t have been possible without him and I am positive he will be returning next season. In his press conference after the game he was crying and stated “You can point a finger at him, you can talk about the vacation, and if you do that, it’s really unfair. That’s my teammate . . . we lost as a team.” You can say whatever you want about TO, but he is a character individual that any team would be lucky to have.

Wade Phillips is a good coach. There is no way we could have even won a game if he wasn’t. However, this team is not disciplined. The Cowboys were one of the most highly penalized teams in the league. I like Wade’s style dealing with his players off the field and he way of addressing the media. You really should be everyone’s best friend when you’re not at work. However, on the practice field and during the games, you better be ready to rip someone’s head off when they fuck up. Not once have I seen him go up to a played and scream like there was no tomorrow. As an authority figure you have to be loved and feared, if you don’t have both then you will ultimately fail. Parcells wasn’t loved and Phillips certainly isn’t feared. All I am saying, is that Wade needs to let is anger go every now and again to show who is really in charge. When he does that, winning a playoff game will come naturally.

At the end of next this coming week Tony Sparano will be introduced as the Dolphins head coach. There seems to be no doubt in anyone’s mind that this is happening, so I guess it is time to bid him a due. He served under Parcells and Phillips as the assistant head coach and offensive line for the last three seasons. He even called the plays one of those seasons. He has intensity and he deserves a shot at being the top dog. I wish him the best of luck.

Jason Garret is a very important part of this team. He worked with Sparano this year tweaking the playbook and calling the plays during the games. Jason is an up and coming star in this league and there is no doubt that he deserves to be a head coach in this league. I don’t quite think he is ready though. He has an Ivy League education, but he has never run an offense by himself. If he stays in Dallas and does not take a head job, then he will have that opportunity next year, after Sparano leaves. I like Wade Phillips, but Jason should be the next head coach of the Dallas Cowboys in two seasons. I don’t want to see him go and I don’t think he will.

There aren’t many holes on this team that need that much mending. The secondary needs help. I don’t see Anthony Henry being with this team again next season. The Cowboys have two first round picks and one should almost certainly be a cornerback. Ken Hamlin is a free agent and he deserves a good deal. The Cowboys need him back at all costs. Roy Williams might be destined for early termination. He has blow coverages and he doesn’t hit with the same power that he used to. I would cut Roy Williams. Deon Anderson was having a phenomenal season at fullback before he was hurt, so that really won’t be an issue. Julius Jones is a free agent and he won’t be back; the Cowboys should use a mid round pick to replace him. It is really a toss up whether or not Flozell Adams is coming back. He is a free agent and the Cowboys don’t really want to spend the money on him. I could see them franchise tagging him for a season while they get Doug Free ready. The Cowboys need to get younger at wide receiver and I could see them going that way early in the draft. Aside from that this team seems set and I don’t think we are going to in for a very interesting off-season.

All in all the Cowboys self-destructed and blew the game. Have a nice long off-season boys, but come back ready to win the Super Bowl. Anything less is going to be a bigger disappointment then this season.