Brandon's Buzz

We all get a week to catch our collective breaths following the end-of-September blowout and in preparation for the imminent holiday shopping onslaught. Behold:

She is nothing less than one of the finest singers in the history of the world, and to the betterment of everyone, the divine Linda Eder is back in the spotlight with her eleventh studio album, Soundtrack. A covers project, the album contains adventurous renditions of a handful of Eder’s favorite film tunes, including modern standards like “Everything I Do (I Do It for You)” (from Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves) and “Accidentally in Love” (from Shrek). But the undeniable standout track is a wildly bold take on last year’s Academy Award winner for Best Original Song, Once’s “Falling Slowly.” If you, like me, can scarcely imagine anybody on the planet besides Glen and Marketa singing those words, just wait ’til you get a load of this.

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Another relatively light week is on tap, although if you’re feeling nostalgic, you’ll find a pair of touchstones — one from the ’80s, one from the ’90s — in the pipeline as you do your shopping this Tuesday. Behold:

After an endless wait, one of television’s smartest and most beloved situation comedies finally began making its way to DVD last year, and the latest release arrives this week. The Fourth Season of Family Ties was a watershed one for the series; having been paired with “The Cosby Show” on Thursday nights, the show was finally a ratings bonanza after several years of flying below the radar, and thanks to box office smash Back to the Future, its young star Michael J. Fox had just become a bona fide superstar. Season four also introduced to the series two of its funniest and most memorable ancillary characters, as the oldest Keaton kids both found true love: Alex, with fellow co-ed Ellen Reed (the terrific Tracy Pollan), and Mallory, with dropout sculptor Nick Moore (the hilarious Scott Valentine). The resulting complications — Alex deciding to take up ballet, or the riotous family dinner in which Mallory introduced Nick to the mortified Keaton clan, to name but two — rank among the show’s most remarkable moments.

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The long-awaited release of an almost twenty year old classic sitcom, plus the latest works from a pair of relative newcomers who seem poised for strong second acts, highlight the coming week. Let’s dive right in:

Two years ago, a percussive thriller called Boys and Girls in America — a wild blast that whipped hints of country, rock, blues, and straight-up punk into one frothy hell of a fucked-up fromage — punched The Hold Steady’s ticket to the big time. Looking to build on that buzz, the group — led by the gruff Craig Finn (and don’t ask me why the stark contrast between dark voice and light lyric works this well) — is up this week with its fourth album, Stay Positive.

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A Canadian bubblegum pop star in her teens, and a misunderstood (and, to a large extent, mischaracterized) angry young female (and, at that, one who singlehandedly touched off a deafening revolution for women in rock) in her twenties, the tenaciously divine Alanis Morissette has mellowed markedly as she navigates her thirties, though that fact may not be immediately evident upon first listen to Flavors of Entanglement, Morissette’s texturally dense eighth studio album. Inspired by her brutal breakup with actor Ryan Reynolds, Entanglement finds its author being lured into intriguing new sonic territory by producer Guy Sigsworth (co-writer of Seal’s 1991 classic debut “Crazy,” and best known for his striking work with the lovably psychotic Imogen Heap), who grafts rougher-hewn guitars and touches of electronica onto Morissette’s typically untidy prose.

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Admittedly, Brooke, I’m biased.

Sixteen years ago this August, an astonishing flame-haired raven name of Tori Amos cajoled her incomparably seductive self into my life and instantaneously hurled my very being straight and plumb off its axis. For reasons that aren’t remotely relevant to this particular conversation — though they merit (and will almost certainly eventually win) their own future blog post — 1992 remains, in its own way, the single most important and noteworthy of my 32 years on this planet. Thanks wholly to unrequited, emotionally draining crushes on Craig Doughten and Annie Lennox — and, all these eons later, it remains a fair toss-up which of those two people was more unattainable, despite my daily access to no fewer than one of them — it was the first year I got really serious both about writing and about music appreciation. Quite true, I had always loved music — hey, I still remember, and with the fondest grace in my heart’s most sacred quadrant, Dad driving his downright giddy eight year old son up to the TG&Y to buy anything that contained “Karma Chameleon,” and trust me here if nowhere else: yes, Brooke, an eight year old’s palms can sweat, honey — but ‘92 tore across my mind like a gale, like an huracán.

Nothing was left standing.

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