Metafilter thread asking what bands put on the best live shows.

On the way home from dropping Emmett off I heard Dave Edmund's cover of "Girls Talk" and was wishing for a comprehensive Rockpile compilation with all their backing work on the Lowe and Edmund's solo albums plus Billy Bremner's singles plus that great live bootleg of them playing in DC with Keith Richards.

They understood the verities.

So, um... how bad is this?

Internet radio dealt severe blow as Copyright Board rejects appeal

A panel of judges at the Copyright Royalty Board has denied a request from the NPR and a number of other webcasters to reconsider a March ruling that would force Internet radio services to pay crippling royalties. The panel's ruling reaffirmed the original CRB decision in every respect, with the exception of how the royalties will be calculated. Instead of charging a royalty for each time a song is heard by a listener online, Internet broadcasters will be able pay royalties based on average listening hours through the end of 2008.

The ruling is a huge blow to online broadcasters, and the new royalty structure could knock a large number of them off the 'Net entirely.

eta: The nitty-gritty... From the Save Internet Radio site:

[link]

The Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) decision increases the royalties that Internet webcasters pay to play music by nearly 300% for the biggest webcasters and up to 1200% for small webcasters.

The CRB rates are retroactive to January 1, 2006 and payable on May 15, 2007. This decision could bankrupt many Internet radio services immediately on that date, even if it is effective for only one day.

Past due royalties alone will be enough to bankrupt virtually all small and mid-sized webcasters, many of whom are the hallmarks of programming diversity.

Hopefully, Congress will get involved?

I think it's pretty bad. Pandora has been sending me e-mails about it.

This Marnie Stern album (In Advance of the Broken Arm) is so weird. She's the anti-Joanna Newsom. I mean, I assume a few of y'all are familiar with it, but for those who aren't, she's an indie-rock chick who plays virtuoso wheedla-wheedla guitar (with Steve Vai-style precision and speed), but puts all those notes into service for skronky noise-pop, Deerhoof-like songs, while she declaims like a female Mark E. Smith over the top. She's so far out of leftfield that I get disoriented.

Of interest probably only to me, but I just figured out that Tom Waits recorded Swordfishtrombones at Sunset Studios in Hollywood. Which is where a couple Beefheart songs were recorded, ("Moonlight on Vermont" and "Veteran's Day Poppy") Exile on Main Street, various early Disney projects and Prince's Purple Rain.

All of which relate to Tom Waits as influences in various ways. The falsetto that he uses on "Shore Leave" and "Temptation", for instance, grew out of his love for the Stone's "I Just Wanna See His Face" and his Prince fanboyishness. (Tom is also a huge fan of Missy Elliot.)

Beefheart is, of course, a big influence on all Tom's 80s work (I can say this authoritatively now that I've listened to Lick My Decals Off, Baby and The Spotlight Kid which feature lots of Waitsian marimba), and Tom's cover of "Heigh Ho" is still one of the coolest and most eerie covers ever.

Hey, you know what's a great song on Exile that everybody should listen to today? "Let It Loose"

Other Sunset Sound recordings: Led Zeppelin IV and Odeley.

OK. Maybe Trout Mask Replica afterwards.

x-posted with Bitches because of our earlier discussion of Crystals and Angels from other planets....

I'm digging this trippy 1977 video of The Carpenters, with a full orchestra, covering Klaatu's amazing "Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft." From the Official Klaatu Homepage:

The idea for this track was suggested by an actual event that is described in The Flying Saucer Reader, a book by Jay David published in 1967. In March 1953 an organization known as the "International Flying Saucer Bureau" sent a bulletin to all its members urging them to participate in an experiment termed "World Contact Day" whereby, at a predetermined date and time, they would attempt to collectively send out a telepathic message to visitors from outer space. The message began with the words..."Calling occupants of interplanetary craft!"

blog thingie: [link]

video: [link]

The video starts out with this cheesy, corny bit of comedy (I think) of aliens calling a radio station's request line.

Is this the most awesome video ever, or what?

One of my brother's and my favorite songs when it came out. Probably still around on LP in one of our homes.