I saw TV On The Radio when they were in town, at First Ave. My gratitude to Sarah and Jesse for providing the occasion and transportation, and to their friend Luke, who volunteers at St Cloud's KVSC, for the plus-one ticket. I had been familiar with TVotR since their first full-length, Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes. As any fan will tell you, that album made for a fantastic major-release debut, and provided a thorough look at their sound, which is extraordinarily unique - to my way of thinking, post-rock is as accurate as you can get with a single label. The album featured some breathtaking highlights, such as the bewildering a capella Ambulance, and the thrumming brilliance of the first track, The Wrong Way [could this be the finest opening seconds in the history of recorded sound?]. The EP Young Liars features some fan favorites, such as the title track, and the truly masterful Satellite, which is the ultimate encapsulation of what TVotR sounds like at their absolute best.

TVotR's set was remarkably high-intensity. The primary vocalist, Tunde Adebimpe, seemed barely in control of his own energy, flinging wild hand-gestures as he performed. Guitarist/founding member [along with Adebimpe] David Andrew Sitek came across as a kind of ROCKnROLL! doofus, assuming superstar postures and whipping his strumming hand into a blur, once or twice taking a line on the microphone from Adebimpe. He opened the show with a set of chimes dangling from the head of his guitar; during quieter moments he would position them near a microphone and waggle the instrument. When he took the chimes down after the first song, it seemed their night was over, but he hung them right back up their for the third song, and there they stayed for most of the rest of the show. I hope he drilled a hole in his guitar specifically for those chimes, like Eric Clapton and his cigarette. In general, TVotR's songs aren't particularly fast, or slow, exhibiting instead a kind of grinding persistence of tempo. Live, however, they infused a definite rock sensibility into a number of songs, playing them hard and fast. The joint, as they say, was jumping. Sadly, however, this approach subtracted from the masterpiece Satellite, sacrificing the tone and fascinating vocal interplay found on the album for less-appropriate speed and power.

I had put off picking up their new full-length, Return to Cookie Mountain, before the show - I had heard it wasn't as good. I'll only tell you once - don't believe it. This album fully develops the post-rock notions hinted at in TVotR's prior releases; this is one of those rare records on which every track has something of value. More than that, it works slickly as a complete and finished work; by comparison, Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes seems like a collection of unrelated songs, sparsely populated with [granted, superb] highlights. TVotR's songs have always had interesting structure: each is clearly determined to shed the verse-chorus-verse model to forward its own structural agenda, but many of the first-generation songs [particularly toward the end of Desperate Youth] had little but structure. On Cookie, the structure is maintained, and is built upon with a vocal melody here, a hook there, and suddenly, where there was only foundation is now a complete piece of music, each of which is strung together until the album is exhausted. Cookie maintains this flow even as its tone is manipulated, opening with the postmoderntechnopunk I Was A Lover [bass-drum triplets?!] and moving into something slower, something fast, something creepy, something loud. On an album full of stand-out songs, one of the highlights is Dirtywhirl, which masquerades in its opening seconds as a slow song, but quickly unfolds into a relentless and infectious pulse, which features the best use of jinglebells ever. Also noteworthy is the slow and starkly beautiful Tonight. Guitarist Kyp Malone takes over the mic on a couple songs, providing an interesting contrast. The release of Cookie which features bonus tracks is well-worth seeking out; after two or three minutes of silence, it kicks back in with another mini-album, including a more driving remix of the sinister Hours. The last of the bonus tracks, however, Things You Can Do, while ill-fitting with the rest of the album [hence its bonus-track position], stands tall by itself, transitioning unexpectedly from quiet and introspective into gorgeous, dark, psychedelic, jaw-dropping afrobeat! It's hard to imagine a more welcome termination for such an album.

In light of its graceful and dexterous cohesion, I believe Return to Cookie Mountain is the most appropriate first-time foray for future fans into TV On The Radio. Become their friend, bind yourself to them with Cookie, and then allow yourself to indulge in their lesser recordings.

My phone, along with the technology that supports it, is the most incredible device ever conceived by the human brain. At first, it was merely an oversized example of cellular technology, which afforded me constant access to my teacher, my mother, my secret lover: my source of information about everything. Since then, using this phone has been a journey of endless surprise and delight. My first breakthrough came on the day when I learned, thanks to the forums at EverythingQ, how to set MP3 files as ringtones. To a music freak / tech geek such as myself, this was huge. No more sifting through Verizon's selections of... Brittany Amber Simpson and Jessica Lohan, looking for a inevitably crappy-sounding tone that I felt defined me as a person - which I was then required to pay for. I'm now on the road to having a different strain of music from my own collection, edited down with Audacity, play for each person who calls me. Since the day of my discovery, JP has become accustomed to my answering his calls with gleeful giggling, having just been treated to a portion of MF Doom's Vomitspit. Beyond that, I have customized sounds for other events - text messages, emails, and the like. When my phone reminds me of an upcoming appointment, it is in the voice of Shuv-Oohl the Mole Man asking: "Have you found Frog Rock yet?" [By the way, the first episode of the next Sam & Max game will be released on November first.]

The next logical step was to find a method for accessing files on my computer, from my phone, remotely. I briefly looked at some conventional fileserver/VPN solutions, such as Hamachi. With the help of the EverythingQ forums once again, I discovered Orb. Download the program, tell it where to find your media, and it will stream all of your music, pictures and video to any web-enabled computer or device - including smartphones - for free. On my phone's browser, I simply go to my Orb website, browse by directory through the media on my computer at home, and it plays. As long as I have my phone and a decent connection, I also have my 50 gigs of music. What is an iPod, again? This technology offers a glimpse into the future; the next step, however, won't be using your phone to access remote files and listen to music - it will be doing the same, doing more, through your network-enabled toothbrush, kitchen appliance, or household pet. And take it from me - it's good. It's very, very good.

We got my mom all married a few weeks ago, and it was a rip-snorting success. We had the benefit of the heavy presence of our friends the Pedersens, with Pastor Darrell officiating, Jennifer singing with my guitar during the suprise musical performance, John photographing [all the above photos courtesy of John Pedersen Photography], and Maisi unexpectedly providing invaluable logistical services, such as running down people she had never met before, and attaching flowers to their clothing.

My brother and I ran around for a day or two in advance, accomplishing tasks such as setting up [his] audio equipment at the reception hall, and picking up many, many pounds of canned food at the store, which the bride and groom had requested as donations to the Food Shelf, in lieu of gifts. Although we thought our collection was exemplary, it turned out we were bested by at least two or three families, who brought bathtub-sized baskets filled with offerings for the less fortunate. Stan weighed the booty on his scale, and it came to four-hundred sixty-two pounds, in addition to around one-hundred dollars in cash donations.

I was very happy with our music selections, and how it sounded at the reception hall. During dinner, we played mostly jazz, with some classical thrown in [mostly Mozart, and a little Holst], and I thought it created an atmosphere that was at once classy and relaxed. I was trying to wait for the staff to clear the tables to change to the post-dinner music, however, and as a result probably let the dinner music go too long; a lot of people had left before it started up. The music for this section was a combination of the efforts of Mom and Stan, Andy, Sarah, Jesse, and myself. The collection is... rather eclectic, featuring Abba to Wilco, and everything in between. However, we got the most important songs played, and the rest will provide customized listening for years to come. [If anyone is interested in hearing the collection, get a hold of me, and we'll make an arrangement.]

Beyond the couple, the show's star was Victoria Rose, Peter and Rachel's new one, who was around four weeks of age at the time. That child has a greater range of expression than I've seen in one so young; her tiny face seemed to be constantly in flux. Her parents were remarkably free with her; Pete happened to walk by me and asked if I wanted to hold her. I had the added opportunity to feed her, and her father was completely in stride with her behavior: "Give her just a little milk... okay, that's enough. Now she'll cringe a bit, because the milk is cold... there it is, now a bit more milk... and the milk is still cold... okay, she's recovered. Now a bit more milk, and there, she's done."

The event also marked the first time in anyone's memory [decades?] that my grandmother and all five of her children were together in the same place. There was a family reunion-style photo session outside, with our photographer. Despite this potentially trying situation, John handled himself with remarkable poise, even going so far as to snap photographs for various relatives with their own cameras, when they were summoned to join the group. My mother gushed about John's professionalism and enthusiasm during the first several times I spoke with her after the wedding; we're lucky to have those Pedersens close to our family.

The day after, we went to see the house, now that my mom has moved in, and it's become a very comfortable and rustic environment. It's nicely tucked in the woods, and from certain vantages, it isn't evident that there is any civilization around. My mom showed us a beautiful box that Stan's friend Zach had made for her from a found piece of wood - I believe it had been a fencepost - which was meant to contain various objects from the wedding: handwritten vows, program, and a rose, which had dictated the length of the box. The couple, bound shortly for the Naniboujou on the North Shore, bestowed food upon us, left over from the reception, and that was the weekend. Here's to a happy wedding.

I saw Werner Herzog's The White Diamond, a documentary about a rather emotional flight engineer who brings his airship project to Guyana. Like a lot of Herzog's documentary work, I found it to be loose and unfocused; a lot of time seemed to be spent on nonessential matter. Herzog's style of interview can sometimes be patronizing; sometimes he seems to be putting words in his subjects' mouths ("Would you like to use this airship to travel to your family in Europe?"). One observation that I think can apply to the majority of Herzog's work is that it is driven more by personal ambition than by professionalism and his sense of documentarian's responsibility [if he has one]. However, because of this approach, the man is able to get into places and encounter people that are often... completely unique. I don't think that anyone whose brain is awake will generally take the information he presents as authoritative, and as long as that is assumed, I think his films are worth watching, as you'll likely see things you won't see anywhere else.

Here's the main think about The White Diamond: watch it, because it also has some amazing stuff, particularly if you like [trust me] roosters.