Lo & behold, what was in my mailbox but a bundle of good cheer courtesy of Rae! I never did write him after I saw someone on television who had the same last name & looked EXACTLY like him being interviewed about something or other, but I will as I still haven't forgotten about that. I do wish he had better access to a computer...

On the Asylum someone put up a post asking if 2004 wasn't the worst year for music. The ROCK board over there is heavily populated by folks who are indeed boomer fogies stuck in the 60s & 70s, which is something not worthy of further editorial comment; if you're reading this, you probably know what I mean. But the guy who put this up is a guy I was surprised to see this from, as he's very knowledgeable about music & listens to a ton of new stuff...and rarely utters the sorts of proclamations about how music all sucks these days as is common with some of the crusties over there. I had to...how do I put this? I had to motherf*cking disagree with him. I thought it was a GREAT year for music, the best in many years. I started to write a brief response & it turned into a manifesto on the year. I don't think there's much I hit on that I didn't mention here on this board at some point or another, so it's redundant to me in that way, which means it may be redundant to you. Except maybe it isn't. Warning, one of my typically overly long screeds follows. Beware.