Few people appreciate a band that, for instance, will record a retelling of Jude the Obscure crossed with the Beatles' "Hey Jude" ("Hey! Susan"), write a song about the story-within-a-story from Red Harvest ("Flitcraft") or work telling details from an obscure overtly Marxist historian's best work - The Making of the English Working Class by E.P. Thompson - into a fun song about the oldest pub in London ("The Olde Trip To Jerusalem"). I don't know why.

Back on the rap covers by non-rappers, I think I have a new champion. Jonathan Coulton covers "Baby Got Back."

Weird. I'm, this very moment, listening to a tongue-in-cheek power pop song of his.

In the rest of the world, they sell in the high dozens.

In the words of one of their contemporaries' recent album titles, fifty thousand Mekons fans can't be wrong!

Corwood, you are so wrong about [Heart], we will just have to pass over it in silence. And "Orpheus" is not their best song - "Sympathy for the Mekons," "Memphis, Egypt," "Fletcher Christian" and possibly "Take His Name In Vain" are at least as good.

Corwood, you are so wrong about [Heart], we will just have to pass over it in silence.

Hey, I know it's controversial, but (Heart) nearly put me off the Meeks for good. I appreciate the album more with time, but, well, this is the point where silence and peace are the best options.

And "Orpheus" is not their best song - "Sympathy for the Mekons," "Memphis, Egypt," "Fletcher Christian" and possibly "Take His Name In Vain" are at least as good.

Those are all wonderful, brilliant, stunning, perfect songs, as are a few dozen other Mekons songs. "Orpheus," to my mind, is so great that even the guy who came over after my band played "Memphis, Egypt" a few years back to ask if we knew a second chord, even that philistine of a jackass would have to scrape his jaw off the floor afterwards.

The very last song Bauhaus performed at the concert tonight?

Bela Lugosi's Dead.

All is right with the world.

Did Peter Murphy do his little chest-wiggle move? Were there fishnet shirts to be seen?

Did Peter Murphy do his little chest-wiggle move?

Ohmyyes.

Were there fishnet shirts to be seen?

Not on the band, but in the audience? You betcha. Including two *darling* deathrocker boys complete w/ big spiky hair, skin-tight black jeans, pointy boots, leather jackets, and smudgey eyeliner. I wanted to keep them as pets.

John Darnielle on the eternal question "who can indie boys crush on, now that Scarlett Johanssen has gone mainstream?" [link]

(ETA: link is to Nerve.com, which some companies do block. Forewarned, etc.)

My indie cred is non-existent, and I don't know what a "nu-emo boy" is, but I'll nominate Eleanor Friedberger.

David, do you know about this?. (I would say what "this" is, but I hope it's a surprise and I don't want to ruin it.)

That link reminds me: how can I set my default so that websites with music or other sounds don't play unless I tell them to? Drives me absolutely buggy, esp. at work. IE 6.0 at work, Firefox at home. Home is less of a problem since I have headphones, but I listen to streaming radio all day at work & I hate hate hate opening a website that starts blaring past the radio. Thanks in advance for the help.

David, do you know about this?. (I would say what "this" is, but I hope it's a surprise and I don't want to ruin it.)

Right the fuck on! I'd heard they were shooting it before he died, but I didn't know it was going to be finished. Looks like have a lot of old Dolls footage which makes me reach for my drool bib.