While checking the increasing thinnage in the mirror at City Lights after getting a haircut, I heard some of the bonus tracks on the Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain reissue at a listening booth. I need to pick this up. There are few albums I have a more sentimental connection to, and hearing new-to-me songs from that era is a pretty powerful experience. I'll save it for xmas break, when my townie friends will be back around to remind me that I eventually did get to live out my "Gold Soundz" fantasy from 9th grade.

Saw copies of Rhythm Of The Saints, a cheap Band comp, Workingman's Dead and Sheryl Crow in the new used pile and asked Tyler if somebody had died. Those aren't albums college students outgrow; those are albums older professionals leave someone in their will. Greg said someone with a kid on his arm had sold them back. "I guarantee he just downloaded them all onto his ipod," he noted.

My response: "Ah, soul death."

I'd just indulged in self-consciousness about balding, nostalgia and cranky technophobia within a five minute period. I was even about to bitch about how I couldn't figure out how to make Soulseek work. It was clear I'd have to complete my transformation into a Gang Of Four lyric and buy something to make myself feel better. Almost picked up the new Placebo compilation (cuz new music is so scary that I'm actually nostalgiac for trends I didn't dig the first time around), but instead I bought Shake The Sheets: exuberant music from an indie vet who has improved his game over time - plus he's balding! The radio station copy wouldn't burn entirely and I'm guessing that was God's way of saying I should finally give Leo a lil' bit of royalty after playing my taped copy of Hearts Of Oak so often.

That's not what I'm listening to right now, though. I'm enjoying a band called the Human Television that my friend Max put on a tape after the Cruising soundtrack, which he grabbed before I could at the big radio record sale a few months back. The soundtrack is filled with trashy throb-rock (much more amusing than the movie) and the Human Television is some terrific old school jangle. I bet the Mystical Beast knows all about these guys - probably has posted three tracks. I should find out more. Update: it turns out that Human Television is a new band. I am flabbergasted.

In short: I feel rather old right now. Apologies to those of you reading this who are considerably older.

Btw, I have no respect for Joshua Clover a.k.a. Jane Dark a.k.a. Felizitas a.k.a. the most chickenshit music critic in history.