I AM STRONGER THAN MENSA, MILLER AND MAILER

- I have a Twitter now, if you'd like to stalk me for whatever reason.

- Up is a really great movie that you should definitely see if you haven't already but I don't have the energy to type about what makes it so good for very long. Suffice to say: it's funny, it's heart-warming, it's surprisingly emotional at times and the animation looks fantastic.

- To continue with the series of posts I started yesterday:

Get Bizzy - Lil Wayne feat. Gudda Gudda

Unlike a good amount of Wayne's material, I can't mount any sort of logical defense as to why I like this. He jacks one of the worst recent rap hit beats (V.I.C.'s "Get Silly"), slobbers all over it in an auto-tuned drool, loses the freakin' beat a couple of times and then hands it over to no-name Gudda for a godawful guest verse. I guess the reason I have it is that it makes me laugh; the boasts and threats here are so "WTF, mate?" that you can't help but laugh. I mean, insulting people because they take Tylenol,and as the first line, no less? Saying you look like there's "red barf" on your neck, and as a boast? I don't know what drugs Wayne was on when he recorded this, but they must have been freakin' awesome. It's not a good song by any stretch of the imagination (not even on a technical rapping level, as Wayne sometimes is) but it is a strangely fascinating one.

Faster - Manic Street Preachers

Probably the best pure piece of song off of one of my favourite albums (the Manics' The Holy Bible); "Faster" functions on two distinct, but equally important, levels. On the surface, it's a hammering piece of strident hard rock goodness, accentuated by the sneaky glam hook in the chorus. The guitar riff is instantly memorable, the rhythm section keeps a deceptively simple, muscular pace and James Dean Bradfield's vocals have such a popped-vein intensity, he could be singing about cupcakes and it would still register as the most emotionally wrenching topic ever. But, the thing is, the words he's singing are equally as interesting as the band's delivery. Of course, if you are at all familiar with the Manics, you know the sad story of guitarist/lyricist Richey Edwards and his disappearance after the recording of The Holy Bible, so, I won't continue to beat that dead horse here. But, I will say that, if one removed the music and cut out the second chorus repeat, I believe that the lyrics could stand on their own as free verse. An exquisite jumble of slogans ("Self-disgust is self-obessesion"), self-aware angst ("I know I believe in nothing but it is my nothing") and flat-out nihilism ("Man kills everything"), it paints a fascinating, if disturbing, picture of its writer. And, yeah, okay, it probably gains a few automatic points from me for name-dropping Sylvia Plath (and right after Norman Mailer, no less!) in the chorus, but, still. The kind of cryptic lyricism on display here is throughout the whole of The Holy Bible but this is the one song where the music doesn't feel subservient to it (and give Bradfield a lot of credit for hemming Edwards' words into something of a coherent melody). It's a great album all around, though. And see if you agree with me about those lyrics.

Have You Forgotten - Red House Painters

A complete 180 from the Manics intense, cryptic and LOUD nihilism is this song by premiere sensitive-indie-dude Mark Kozelek which is likely the definition of open-heart sincerity; it's pretty much the most soft-spoken and charming love song you'll ever here. The words scan like the kind of thing a high school guy would write for the girl he's had a crush on since they were in elementary school (right down to the out-of-place curse words) and Kozelek sings it with such an earnest, untaught ease it's easy to overlook the occasionally clunky lines (he rhymes "nice" with "nice" at one point, natch). Of course, it's emotional cat-nip for the kinds of guys who feel this way themselves (no comment on whether that applies to me) and the girls who wish most guys were "more sensitive", but sometimes we all need this sort of music. It's as comfortable as a fluffy pair of slippers and as calming as a cup of tea or a summer wind. And thank god it hasn't been co-opted (yet), as one of the official "songs to learn on acoustic to pick up chicks".