OK, I got my iPod for Christmas, and have used it more or less every workday since, and whenever I’m in the car, via a cassette deck adapter meant for portable CD players. (Much cheaper than the iPod adapters that do the exact same thing.)
So, after countless hours of play, here’s what my Top 100 list looks like, minus surf music, which is sorted into its own chart for me to play. (“Theme from ‘Endless Summer'” by the Sandals would be the only surf song that would chart had I included them, but it would have come in at #19 with a bullet.)
1. “Golden Touch” by Razorlight
2. “Bad Boyfriend” by Garbage
3. “Somewhere Only We Know” by Keane
4. “Love Spreads” by the Stone Roses
5. “Blue Orchid” by the White Stripes
6. “Hey Ya!” by Outkast
7. “Bombs Away” by Paris Texas
8. “Rocks” by Primal Scream
9. “She’s a Knockout” by Social Distortion
10. “C’mon C’mon” by the Von Bondies
11. “Fell in Love with a Girl” by the White Stripes
12. “Give It Up” by Pepper
13. “Walkie Talkie Man” by Steriogram
14. “Born With a Tail” by the Supersuckers
15. “Ya Think She’d Be Good to Me” by CC Adcock
16. “Heroin Girl” by Everclear
17. “Eleanor” by Low Millions
18. “Dyslexic Heart” by Paul Westerberg
19. “What’s Up?” by 4 Non Blondes
20. “Miracle Drug” by A.C. Newman
21. “Jerk It Out” by Caesars
22. “Wonderful Night” by Fatboy Slim
23. “Stacy’s Mom” by Fountains of Wayne
24. “Cold Hard Bitch” by Jet
25. “No New Tale to Tell” by Love and Rockets
26. “Ashes to Ashes” by Steve Earle
27. “Beverly Hills” by Weezer
28. “Hey Mama” by Black Eyed Peas
29. “Word Up!” (7″ Vocal Version) by Cameo
30. “Baby Did a Bad Bad Thing” by Chris Isaak
31. “God Is a Bullet” by Concrete Blonde
32. “Mr. Jones” by Counting Crows
33. “Butterfly” by Crazy Town
34. “Fall Behind Me” by the Donnas
35. “Boyz-N-The Hood” by Dynamite Hack
36. “Here I Am” by the Explosion
37. “Are You Gonna Be My Girl” by Jet
38. “Polyester Bride” by Liz Phair
39. “So Alive” by Love and Rockets
40. “(I’m Your) Hoochie Coochie Man” (1954 Single Version) by Muddy Waters
41. “Common People” (Full Length Version) by Pulp
42. “Black Betty” by Spiderbait
43. “The Geeks Get the Girls” (Album Version) by American Hi-Fi
44. “Intergalactic” by the Beastie Boys
45. “Hey Ladies” by the Beastie Boys
46. “Short Skirt/Long Jacket” by Cake
47. “Brimful of Asha” by Cornershop
48. “Friend of the Devil” by Grateful Dead
49. “Fell In Love with a Boy” by Joss Stone
50. “Somebody Told Me” by The Killers
51. “Figured You Out” by Nickelback
52. “Higher Ground” by the Red Hot Chili Peppers
53. “Bad Luck” by Social Distortion
54. “What I Got” by Sublime
55. “Diamonds and Guns” by the Transplants
56. “Blister in the Sun” by Violent Femmes
57. “So What’cha Want” by the Beastie Boys
58. “Girls” by the Beastie Boys
59. “Girl” by Beck
60. “GHETTOCHIP MALFUNCTION (Hell Yes)” by Beck
61. “Where It’s At” by Beck
62. “Song 2” by Blur
63. “I Love You ‘Cause I Have To” by Dogs Die In Hot Cars
64. “Times Like These” by Foo Fighters
65. “New Sensation” by INXS
66. “The Rainbow Connection” by Jason Mraz
67. “Club Foot” by Kasabian
68. “The Denial Twist” by the White Stripes
69. “Ch-Check It Out” by the Beastie Boys
70. “Everything Zen” by Bush
71. “We Used to Be Friends” by the Dandy Warhols
72. “The Rainbow Connection” by the Dixie Chicks
73. “Santa Monica” by Everclear
74. “Big Me” by Foo Fighters
75. “Maureen” by Fountains of Wayne
76. “Been Caught Stealing” by Jane’s Addiction
77. “Till I Get to You” (Radio Edit) by Nikka Costa
78. “Californication” by the Red Hot Chili Peppers
79. “Seven Nation Army” by the White Stripes
80. “The Metro” by Berlin
81. “I Don’t Want to Be” by Bo Bice
82. “1985” by Bowling for Soup
83. “Cannonball” by the Breeders
84. “Kung Fu Fighting” by Carl Douglas
85. “I Will Buy You A New Life” (Live) by Everclear
86. “Learn to Fly” by Foo Fighters
87. “Hate To Say I Told You So” by the Hives
88. “Slow Hands” (Dan The Automator Remix) by Interpol
89. “Devil Inside” by INXS
90. “Insanity” by Liz Phair
91. “Erecting a Movie Star” by Liz Phair
92. “True Faith” by New Order
93. “Come Out and Play” by the Offspring
94. “Starry Eyed Surprise” by Paul Oakenfold
95. “Glory Box” by Portishead
96. “No One Knows” by Queens of the Stone Age
97. “Little Miss Can’t Be Wrong” by Spin Doctors
98. “Superstition” by Stevie Wonder
99. “Werewolves of London” by Warren Zevon
100. “Hazy Shade of Winter” by the Bangles
Some of this stuff is pretty surprising — How the heck did I end up with so many Foo Fighters in the top 100? Where is all the Sublime and Social Distortion I listen to? — but it’s (obviously) indicative of what I’ve been listening to since December.
If someone can come up with a way to track a week at a time — iTunes seems to only know how to track lifetime play counts, not shorter periods — let me know.
It’ll be interesting to see how much this list has changed by January 1, 2006.
OK, maybe not the Eye of Sauron, because that was shot with a special filter that blocks out most of the light from the star Fomalhaut at the heart of its solar system. What’s really significant about this — beyond it looking cool — is that it’s pretty definite confirmation of a planet nearby, sweeping through stellar dust as it orbits.
From the New Scientist:
The most likely explanation is that the gravity of one or more unseen planets is dragging the ring askew. The fact that the inner edge of the ring is relatively well-defined adds further weight to the argument because it suggests the unseen planets are sweeping up stray dust within the radius of the ring.
The image was captured by astronomers at the University of California, Berkeley, US, and NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center using Hubble’s coronagraph. This device blocks the glare of a star while gathering the faint reflected light from any surrounding ring.
Odds that the planet will be called Mordor are pretty high, I’m guessing.
Every version of the “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
” — radio show, book, TV show, computer game, comic book — was different, and all of them had input or direct creative control by Douglas Adams. So it is that the movie version of that most wholly remarkable book again strays from the well-trodden space lanes into wild and woolly backwaters and some of the strangest Hitchhikers’ adventures yet.
For the uninitiated, “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” tells the story of what happens after the Earth is destroyed to make way for an interstellar bypass (because you’ve got to build bypasses), including discovering what the whole point of the Earth was to begin with. It helps that one of Arthur Dent’s good friends was an alien researcher for the interstellar travel book and general encyclopedia, the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, and not from Guilford after all. They’re picked up by the president of the galaxy, who is tooling around the galaxy in a stolen spaceship and, incidentally, has picked up a girl that Arthur really liked, but totally failed to pick up at a party back in England.
For those familiar with the other iterations of the story, the familiar beats are (mostly) here: The Vogon Constructor Fleet darkening the skies above the Earth, Vogon poetry, the Babel fish, Marvin the Paranoid Android, the short unhappy life of a sperm whale, Deep Thought, the fjord-designing Slartibartfast and a Guide full of dubious wisdom.
What’s really interesting for long-term fans (and what are arguably the most successful parts of the film) are all the new bits: See! The Vogon homeworld, Vogsphere! Meet! The candidate Zaphod Beeblebrox beat out for the presidency! Marvel! At the gun designed by Deep Thought! Get Slapped! By a hilarious security system-cum-behavioral management system!
Although the film isn’t perfect — it would probably be hard to please everyone with this film, frankly — the script is strong, the effects top notch (although it’s a little frustrating that filmmakers avoided most of the technical challenges presented by Zaphod’s alien physiology), the actors acquit themselves well (Sam Rockwell as Zaphod is so good, you want to strangle him with your bare hands) and overall, it’s a great deal of fun, if not the home run that long-time fans hoped it might be. (But then, it’s also not the disaster it could have been, which was a strong, strong possibility.)
Recommended for fans of Monty Python, Terry Gilliam and, of course, Hitchhiker fans of all shapes and sizes. The film version of “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” strikes out for new directions in the best tradition of the story, and is a great tribute to the spirit and sensibility of the late, great Douglas Adams. (And look for more than one appearance of his portrait in the film, a very classy move by filmmakers.)
(Originally spotted over on Rob Worley’s site. And you thought my URL was obscure.)
If, somewhere along the way in your journalism career, you get a chance to interview Keith Giffen, do it. There’s no better quote machine in the comics industry, and I throw Stan Lee, Neil Gaiman, Jim Steranko and anyone else you can think of into the ring to slug it out with him.
Comixfan: While we’re on the subject, after Drax and Defenders, what else do you have planned at Marvel?
Giffen: A series with a classic name, that I am not at liberty to discuss right now. Simply because, Marvel and DC now like to announce, and the minute they announce, I’ll talk about it. Like Drax, I’ve been done with Drax for four months. Well, Andy keeps calling me and going ‘Can you fix this?’, but the actual bulk work has been done for a while, but then they announce it in Philadelphia, and I can talk about it. It’s business. The guy who created Viagra wasn’t going around going ‘We can give you an erection!’ before Pfizer announced it. Which is kind of interesting, because everyone knows Pfizer makes Viagra, but what’s the name of the guy who created it?
Comixfan: I have no idea… [laughs]
Giffen: Ah ha, so its not just comics doing that. At least comics will say ‘created by Keith Giffen and Roger Slifer’ on Lobo. Work for hire lives…
Interviewing Giffen is sort of like riding a bucking bronco — you grip that phone and your keyboard and hold on, because you’re going at light speed all over the map, and if you can’t keep up, well, you should look into Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing, bud.
And you know I’m telling the truth, because I didn’t write this interview and, frankly, I don’t think that I’d ever heard of Comixfan before today. But Giffen interviews are goodness, although it looks like they cut most of the profanity and the slams of the comic industry as a whole. Or maybe it’ll be in Part Two.
While I’m on the subject of iTunes, this week is one of those not-common-enough weeks where at least one of the free downloads is definitely worth grabbing. That isn’t to say they never have good stuff — I really enjoy American Hi-Fi’s “The Geeks Get the Girls” and, of course, Paris Texas’ “Bombs Away” — but more often than not, it’s too poppy or cheesy hip-hop. (And no, this isn’t the Top 100 list yet — you’re being punished because NO ONE has voted for my “Monstrous Regiment” review yet, so you’ll have to wait until Friday.)
This week, though, one of the two tracks is the White Stripes on “Fresh Air.” While Terry Gross makes me giggle sometimes — every time she says the name of the show, I picture her doing jazz hands — she does a great interview. (Incidentally, this was the first time I heard that Jack and Meg White aren’t brother and sister at all, but are a divorced married couple. Apparently, I’m only a mere four years behind the times on this news.)
The band’s new album, “Get Behind Me Satan,” is simply smoking, and the debut single, “Blue Orchid,” is already one of my favorite rock and roll songs of all time, combining Meg’s serious cymbal abuse, a driving guitar riff and Jack’s signature indecipherable-yet-compelling lyrics. It’s the kind of music that makes you want to drive way too fast down the highway and howl at the moon. (It’s suggested you do these two things at seperate times.)
Gross interviews the duo about the making of the new album, touches on the origins of their music and talks about Jack producing Loretta Lynn’s most recent album. All in all, well worth the listen. And along the way, there’s a lot of the band’s music, along with a song of Lynn’s.
So, anyway, make sure to download that edition of “Fresh Air” and remember to do jazz hands whenever Gross says the show’s name. It really adds a lot to the experience.
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