Brandon's Buzz

The flair board is slowly but surely filling itself in.  Latest additions:  a quartet of buttons I constructed with my own ingenuity — three of them featuring my all-time favorite soap actress Laura Wright (who became a star on “Guiding Light” and is now setting Port Chuckles on fire over at “General Hospital”), and one of them, a brilliant rendition of my beloved Stop the Insanity-era Susan Powter; buttons for two of my all-time favorite television personalities (Judge Judy and Tom Snyder) and films (The Silence of the Lambs and Dancer, Texas, Pop. 81); a tribute to Tetris, the greatest video game in the history of home entertainment, and to Rent, which just exited the Great White Way after a historic twelve year run; a gorgeously stylized shot of fingers tickling the ivories (I’ve always had this thing for piano players; sue me); the lovely Miss Bonnie Tyler (just looking at that photo makes me want to scream in my finest rasp, “You’re such a pretty boy / lemme tell you what to do / and you’ll do it!” ); a hilarious button which offers optimistic hope for the future**; and finally, the patented Buzz button, whose creator won’t rest until he sees it front and center on every last Facebook corkboard.

** “I dream of a better world where chickens can cross roads without having their motives questioned.”

Sorry for the brief delay in this week’s record store report — Sherry Ann has been so antsy anticipating this, it’s hard to ponder how she survived the pre-Buzz days — but here we go, with yet another brilliance-packed week before us. Buckle up, kids: we’ve got fourteen albums to discuss.

Solid proof that you shouldn’t judge books by covers:  in the same week in which word has broken that Rob Thomas’ second solo album is due next spring, Matchbox Twenty’s guitarist (and former drummer) Paul Doucette — who, throughout his band’s entire history, has never failed to represent himself as an irritatingly sarcastic horse’s ass — scores a home run as the leader of a fascinating new side project,
The Break and Repair Method.  An album of pleasant melody and stunning depth, Milk the Bee finds Doucette manning both the piano (and adeptly, at that) and the microphone (and while his vocal prowess is certainly no match for Thomas’, Doucette’s timbre proves to be surprisingly rich), creating a ten-track set whose sensibilities land somewhere in between Wilco’s and Keane’s on the yardstick of pop.  (Even if you ultimately choose to let the album as a whole slip by you, be at least sure to check out track number five, “Calling All Electrical Prints,” the kind of sweet, haunting love song Jeff Tweedy only wishes he could write.)

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“Successful parenting is finding ’80s music on your kid’s iPod.”

— as read on a minivan’s bumper sticker this very afternoon while driving down Interstate 35 in Austin, Texas

Thanks to a terrifying burst of ingenuity this fine morning, I’m pleased to announce that the Buzz has hit the big time.  May I present to you:  the official Brandon’s Buzz piece of flair.

Log on to Facebook, open the Flair application, type “Brandon’s Buzz” in the search box, and the above image is what pops up.  Is this a magnificent crunchy or what?!

And now, a pieces of flair update:  new buttons for one of my favorite movies (the mind-numbingly hysterical Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion), novels (I Know This Much is True, which was Buzzed about here), and singers (Tori Tori, hallelujah); a sly, sweet nod to one of George Michael’s finest fashion statements; courtesy of my pal Chip, a rant on gay marriage; a button immortalizing one the great song lyrics of all time; and finally, in the southeast corner of the board, what could well the Buzz’s new mission statement.

Four tumultuous years after her last release — 2004’s erratic Afrodisiac, which, despite its wild inconsistency, closed with her best-ever track:  the dazzling “Should I Go,” which was built around a riveting sample from Coldplay’s overblown “Clocks” and which sent a clear signal that she was seriously rethinking her lifeplan — Brandy is back, armed with both a cleared mind and with her strongest single since “The Boy is Mine,” the hilarious 1998 bitch-fest that won both herself and Miss Monica well-deserved Grammy awards.   Produced with uncharacteristic simplicity by the prolific Rodney Jerkins, “Right Here (Departed)” forgoes the beat-heavy nature of much of Jerkins’ past discography and makes Brandy’s terrific voice — nearing thirty now, and richer than ever — the song’s unopposed centerpiece.  (Contrast “Departed” with a few of Brandy’s other singles, especially from this decade — 2002’s horrifying trainwreck “What About Us” springs to mind — and you’ll instantly recognize and appreciate what an unexpected gem this truly is.)  The new album is due early next year, and if it sounds anything like its leadoff single, I’d say we’re in for a smashing return to form from an artist whose learning curve has been pretty damned breathtaking to behold.

The physical CD won’t be available until September 30, but Simple Things, the hotly-anticipated sophomore effort from brilliant boy wonder Joshua Radin (whose soothing debut release, 2006’s We Were Here, was a textbook model of shattering grace) went up at iTunes on Tuesday, and I’m here to tell you:  although I detest the idea of buying digital albums — hey, I’m ol’ school, I like having something tangible and concrete, something to hold in my hands, at the end of a transaction — this is probably the closest I’ve ever come to breaking my own rule.  In the end I decided to wait until month’s end (although the ever-expanding torture will be intense), but I broke down and purchased the one album track — “You Got Growin’ Up to Do,” a sweetly haunting duet with one Patty Griffin, a magnificent artist who most certainly knows from such things — that I couldn’t stand not to immediately own.  Combine Radin’s return with imminent new projects from Ray LaMontagne and Rachael Yamagata (herself out to follow up a masterful debut), and you understand that the singer-songwriter movement — seemingly an endangered species in these times when a full four of the crunchy’s top twenty singles have that doofus Akon’s name on them — is still alive and kicking.

Since I can’t find one of these bulletin board set-ups for blogs, I’ve decided to just import my Facebook board daily, so that we can all track the progress.

Today’s additions: a button saluting the late, great “Santa Barbara”; a Brian and Justin button (at the prom, no less!); and a button which prescribes one profoundly simple way to make the whole of television better.

(In case you can’t read that bottom one, it says: “I wish Aaron wrote all the shows on television.” God love the mad genius who created that piece of flair!)

So, I spent a goodly portion of the day on Facebook chatting with a couple of high school friends of mine, and while I was there, I stopped over to check in with my buddy Chip, who was my very first Facebook friend. After writing on his “Wall,” a strange, mesmerizing application on his page entitled “Pieces of Flair” hijacked my attention. If you’re a Facebook newbie, I’ll try my best to describe this application: you get a blank brown square that uncannily resembles a bulletin board, and on this board, you get the opportunity to attach “buttons.” There are literally millions of buttons to choose from, which contain all manner of pictures, sayings, and images.  (There are buttons for EVERYTHING, I’m telling you!  So far, my board has buttons for “Designing Women” and Catherine and Vincent, as well as a humorous one about the staggering price of gasoline, and a sweet one with two hands joining to form the shape of a heart.  But there are buttons for George Michael, Tori Amos, “Friday Night Lights,” and EVERYTHING else you can think of!  (Even “One Tree Hill” buttons, Sherry Ann!)  And, you can upload photos and create your own buttons!)

Below:  a sample board, filled:

And, what mine looks like as of an hour ago (note — Facebook has this dopey rule that you can only acquire three buttons per twenty-four hours; I guess that’s so obsessive-compulsive freaks like me won’t burn up a whole frickin’ day filling up bulletin boards!):

Basically, I find this to be the most breathtakingly brilliant idea I’ve ever seen — I kid you not, there are buttons for EVERYTHING!! — and I’m currently combing the ‘net looking for a non-Facebook-related facsimile of this concept that I can adapt for the Buzz.  I swear to Jesus, if I ever find one (or figure out a way to build one!), I will fill this damned site with my bulletin board.

If anyone out there knows where I can find this (paging you, Mike!), please don’t hesitate to hit me up.  Please.  In this instance (and for this slice of chilling genius), I’m not above groveling.

Another jam-packed week is on tap, even if you don’t count the new country album from Jessica Simpson, which also drops on Tuesday.  (My official stance on that is as follows:  The Buzz carries no water for that vapid tramp.)  Don’t waste time reading this paragraph — there is much greatness that awaits you in the previews that follow.

Released without any fanfare in the summer of 1998, a beautifully haunting record called Dressed Up Like Nebraska quietly introduced the world to a bold new talent name of Josh Rouse.  Ten years and eight albums later, Rouse reflects on the last decade of his life with The Best of the Rykodisc Years, a double-disc, 32-track compilation with pulls together highlights (including, thankfully, Nebraska‘s finest track, “Flair”) from that span of time.

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“The theme for tonight’s Republican convention is, ‘Who is John McCain’ … Tomorrow night’s theme is, ‘Who forgot to check if the vice president’s daughter is pregnant?”‘

— Conan O’Brien, riffing on Sarah Palin’s daughter on “Late Night”

In a smashingly brilliant follow up to last year’s monumental ten-disc Classic Soft Rock collection — the infomercial promoting which was hosted by Graham Russell and Russell Hitchcock (those peerless bastions of ’80s schmaltz who were better recognized by the masses as Air Supply) and was one of the finest, most compelling half-hours of television I have ever witnessed — the fabulous folks at Time-Life have truly outdone themselves with Ultimate Rock Ballads, a new eight-album assemblage of music which pulls together 133 of the most essential percussive dirges from the past four decades into one gloriously cheesy listening experience.

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“When, in the second hour, Garth’s Kelly and Doherty’s Brenda sat across from each other at a table to exchange a few tense lines, it was the teen-soap version of De Niro and Pacino meeting for the first time in Heat: all that buildup, all that tension!”

— the LOL moment — why the hell didn’t I think of that, dammit?! — from Ken Tucker‘s fairly charitable review of the new “90210” in Entertainment Weekly

No offense to the girls who managed to stay afloat in a crowded field during the sun-scorched months — imports Duffy and Leona Lewis both managed to score critical and commercial bullseyes, and Cyndi Lauper, an old friend of ours from way back, came out of nowhere with what was my hands-down favorite album of the summer, the brazenly brilliant Bring Ya to the Brink (more on that in an upcoming now hear this post celebrating the season’s strongest offerings) — but it was, by and large, the guys who made the music of summer 2008 such a pleasant surprise.  Fall is on our doorsteps, but before we close the book on the season just passed, let’s take a glance back at the men (some young, others not so much) who gave us the works of art worth getting out of bed for.

She has never asked me to explain the origins and the depths of my seemingly nonsensical obsession with one Hilary Duff, so I have likewise refrained from forcing Sherry Ann to quantify her fixation with that supreme doofus Jason Mraz.  (Mocking it outright is markedly easier, besides.)  Best known for his inescapably goofy 2003 radio smash “The Remedy (I Won’t Worry),” Mraz and his often-cloying attempts at flippant cleverness have the most mystifying effect on Sherry Ann’s otherwise potent mind.  (However, as the proud owner of all of Duff’s records, up to and including all of the Lizzie McGuire soundtracks — film and television, honey — I understand better than most that we all have our vices.)

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