Alby's Latest Posts
Song of the Day 5/29: Gotye, “Somebody That I Used to Know”
This song has been having a moment – I’ve heard it recently not only on the radio but on the supermarket muzak, and it showed up in my YouTube feed. I thought this was just the random output of an algorithm that decided the No. 1 hit of the year in 2012 was ripe for […]
DL Open Thread Wednesday, May 29, 2024
Closing arguments concluded in the Trump hush-money trial, so the speculation has begun. Few think he’ll be acquitted, but opinion seems split on whether he’ll be convicted. One person who has earned the right to opinionate about Trump is David Cay Johnston, a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter who has covered him, mostly from a financial perspective, […]
DL Open Thread Tuesday, May 28, 2024
Anyone who thinks that removing Benjamin Netanyahu from power would end Israel’s ongoing massacre in Gaza is overlooking an inconvenient truth: Two-thirds of the Israeli public doesn’t just support the war, they support denying humanitarian aid to its victims. There are right-wingers in Israel who make MAGAts look like hippies, like the illegal settlers in […]
Song of the Day 5/28: Iron Butterfly, “In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida”
Doug Ingle, who wrote, sang and played organ on “In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida,” Iron Butterfly’s iconic 1968 hit, died last week at age 78. Ingle was the last surviving member of the lineup that recorded it. The 17-minute title track took up one entire side of the band’s second album and was a lot better known back in […]
Song of the Day 5/27: Richard Sherman, “Feed the Birds”
Richard Sherman, who died last week at 95, penned the lyrics to hundreds of Disney songs from 1960 to 1973 while he and his composer brother, Robert, were employed as staff songwriters for the studio. They churned out the songs for more than a dozen films, both animated and live-action, while also finding time to […]
DL Open Thread Monday, May 27, 2024
The Washington Post’s motto is “democracy dies in darkness.” It doesn’t say anything about dispelling it. You probably saw the story last week about Supreme Court justice Sam Alito flying an upside-down American flag outside his home. You would have read about it three years ago if the WaPo had decided to print it then, […]
Song of the Day 5/26: Stevie Wonder, “Too High”
There’s a reason “the dog ate my homework” was a plausible excuse, and had a better chance of working with teachers who owned dogs: Dogs will eat anything. Too picky for plain paper? Spill a little gravy on it. And so, in the age of legalized marijuana, veterinarians have seen a growing number of pet […]
Song of the Day 5/24: Amy Winehouse, “Love Is a Losing Game”
Guest post by Nathan Arizona We’ve heard a whole lot about Amy Winehouse’s troubled behavior before she died of alcohol poisoning in 2011 at age 27. It sounds like we learn more than we need to about her personal relationships in the new biographical movie “Back to Black.” But you know what would good to […]
Song of the Day 5/23: Paul Simon, “Graceland”
For supermarket tabloids, Elvis is the gift that keeps on giving, even though he’s been dead for nearly 50 years. A headline the Weekly World News might have invented declared that Graceland, Presley’s Memphis mansion-turned-tourist attraction, was up for public auction. A finance company claimed Lisa Marie Presley died with an unpaid loan of $3.8 […]
Song of the Day 5/22: Pixies, “Monkey Gone to Heaven”
Theme music for the heat dome over Mexico that’s causing monkeys to fall dead from the trees. Black Francis wrote “Monkey Gone to Heaven” about the environment 35 years ago, before we even knew about global warming (thanks, Exxon!), so his examples of degradation are ocean dumping and the ozone layer. The latter part of […]
DL Open Thread Wednesday, May 22, 2024
Rehoboth Beach, the resort town of 1,100 year-round residents that gifted Delaware politics with Pete Schwartzkopf and Kathy McGuiness, is embroiled in a controversy that for once involves neither of them. The city, repeatedly turned down in its quest for a new city manager, hired a guy named Taylour Tedder on a pay-and-benefits package surpassed […]
Song of the Day 5/21: Randy Rainbow, “Forty-Five”
This is a weird coincidence. Just a couple of days after featuring “9 to 5” as Song of the Day, Randy Rainbow released a new parody song set to its melody. It’s a warning about the Previous Guy, No. 45, and a warning not to make him No. 47, but I’m concerned that it’s not […]
DL Open Thread Tuesday, May 21, 2024
That Trump trial in New York is getting close to its conclusion, with all the plot twists the writers could think up. Michael Cohen revealed on cross-examination that he stole money from Trump, because of course he did, and a defense witness tried to stare down the judge, which did not go well. Oh well, […]
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