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Music Week
Music WeekMusic: Current count 26780 [26750] rated (+30), 445 [449] unrated (-4).Fairly respectable week, again boosted by looking for records that had showed up on various mid-year lists: last week I...
View ArticleWeekend Roundup
July is a month I can hardly wait to get done with, even though it leaves six or seven weeks of brutal heat to come. This year is about average for Kansas, aside from a surplus of rain that more than...
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Music Week
Music: Current count 26822 [26780] rated (+42), 435 [445] unrated (-10).High rated count is a combination of factors: I've been taking the new jazz queue FIFO, and ran through a dull patch -- only...
View ArticleRNC Update
I started this on day two of the Republican National Convention, and it just kept growing as the writing came in. Still doesn't cover day four, with Trump's monumental acceptance speech, very well, but...
View ArticleWeekend Roundup
First, some leftover (or late-breaking) links on Donald Trump, Mike Pence, and last week's Republican National Convention: Matt Taibbi: Trump's Appetite for Destruction: That was the week that was....
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Music Week
Music: Current count 26851 [26822] rated (+29), 431 [435] unrated (-4).Much better than average week of mail: two packages from Clean Feed in Portugal, one from Fou in France, the new Steve Lehman from...
View ArticleDNC Update
The first day of the Democratic National Convention put the party's best face forward. It featured Michelle Obama, a couple of prominent senators who could have mounted credible campaigns for what...
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Streamnotes (July 2016)
First order of business: I've dropped "Rhapsody" from the column name because the streaming service changed their name to Napster. I started writing these notes in 2007 when Rhapsody kindly gave me a...
View ArticleWeekend Links
After the big post on the Democratic National Convention and the mad scramble to wrap up July's Streamnotes, I figured I'd skip attempting a Weekend Roundup today. I started this in the Notebook, then...
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Music Week
Music: Current count 26875 [26851] rated (+24), 423 [431] unrated (-8).Not a particularly strong rated count -- especially given that I wrapped up a Streamnotes column, but still finding exceptional...
View ArticleWeekend Roundup
I want to start with a paragraph from John Lanchester: Brexit Blues: Immigration, the issue on which Leave campaigned most effectively and most cynically, is the subject on which this bewilderment is...
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Music Week
Music: Current count 26901 [26875] rated (+26), 420 [423] unrated (-3).Another week that's liable to make people think I'm an easy grader, or at least one that has a few soft spots that make him an...
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Downbeat Readers Poll
Voted today in Downbeat's Readers Poll: linkhere, go ahead and vote. Didn't intend on posting this, but took notes and finally decided my ballot might be of some small interest. In the Reader's Poll...
View ArticleTrump
One of the more annoying themes pundits like to spin about Donald Trump is how he represents some sort of populist backlash against the elites who run the country. To do so coherently you have to...
View ArticleWeekend Roundup
First a few loose ends left over from yesterday'sTrump post:For more on populism, see Russell Arben Fox: Ten Theses on Our Populist Moment: He quotes Damon Linker's monumentally stupid claim that...
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Music Week
Music: Current count 26996 [26901] rated (+95), 357 [420] unrated (-63).Early last week I got up and found my new jazz queue was practically empty -- at least didn't have anything I particularly wanted...
View ArticleBook Roundup
Time for another collection of 40 short notes on recent books -- my modest attempt to keep track of what's being published primarily in the fields of politics, history, economics, and social science...
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Music Week
#^d 2016-08-22 #^h Music WeekMusic: Current count 27020 [26996] rated (+24), 359 [357] unrated (+2).Spent much of last week trying to pull yesterday'sBook Roundup post together, barely scratching up...
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Streamnotes (August 2016)
Mostly jazz records this month, plus a few Christgau picks (Konono No. 1, The Kropotkins, Leland Sundries, Lori McKenna, Dawn Oberg, Walter Salas-Humara, Mestre Cupijó, Joi, Pylon, Senegambia Rebel). I...
View ArticleWeekend Roundup
Not very happy with all that follows, let alone all that I haven't gotten to, but it looks like there's enough to chew on for now. Latest odds at 538 show Clinton as having slipped to a 80.9% chance of...
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