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  • 95. And I’ll Lay Right Down In My Favorite Place

    I found a dog collar at Sherri’s house that fit me perfectly — nothing fancy, just a heavy red cotton belt with a buckle and a leash loop.  I imagined that I looked like Cheetah Chrome in it, and even if I didn’t I felt like a Dead Boy so it was good enough for…

  • From The Stacks: The Rocky Horror Picture Disc

    This is a cool little novelty for the Rocky Horror fan in your life.  With a cross appeal to both picture disc and Rocky Horror collectors, this disc usually trades in the ten to twenty-five dollar range.  You think that’s okay? Okay?  I DIDN’T MAKE HIM FOR YOU!

  • The (Kind Of) Complete Woodstock: The Rather Magnificent Mr. Bert Sommer

    Friday August 15, 1969, Bethel, New York.  Artie Kornfeld checks his watch, ten minutes to five o’clock.  A crowd of three hundred thousand kids has congregated in a rented dairy pasture for three days of music.  They mill about, waiting for something to happen, waiting to get it started. Artie turns to his friend, who…

  • From The Stacks: The Jimi Hendrix Experience – Electric Ladyland

    Electric Ladyland is the most interesting album in the Hendrix discography.  The third and last album with the Experience, Electric Ladyland finds our hero in virtually complete creative control and at the top of his game.  Jimi is hitting on all cylinders here as writer, performer, interpreter (Dylan’s “All Along the Watchtower”) and producer.  His…

  • Jane’s Addiction Live: Portland, September 4, 2012

    Portland, Oregon, perhaps my favorite city.  The local beer is delicious, the streets are clean, and the book and record stores are interesting.  The real draw, though, is its people, who are always kind and gracious. Here’s how cool of a town Portland is:  I tweeted a photo of Wimbot, the Why It Matters mascot,…

  • Deep Cuts: Songs For Loneliness

    What’s that?  You say that I can’t put together a playlist of loneliness songs without stooping to mopey sad sack drivel like “Missing You”?  Challenge accepted:

  • A Why It Matters Chapbook For You Tactile Types

    Cinder, the creator of the incredibly cool painting to your left, and I will be attending an event in October to finally sign his “Keep On Stomping” prints.  I had no idea that signing was going to be the hardest thing to coordinate, but there you go. It felt a little odd to coordinate a…

  • 94. A Message That I’m Sending Out Like A Telegraph

    I liked The Babys.  They had a cool sort of seventies AOR thing going on that seemed very adult to an elementary schooler like me, and songs like “Isn’t It Time” were packed with hooks.  In 1982 lead singer John Waite released his first solo album, Ignition.  “Change,” the single off of that album, was…

  • From the Stacks: Tina Turner – Private Dancer (LaserDisc)

    I don’t really have anything interesting to say about this, but I don’t want 1984 to pass without giving a head nod to the long deceased LaserDisc format.  Will these beasts someday have the novelty value of a wax cylinder, reel to reel, or 8-track?  Who knows, but having a dead format or two in…

  • The (Kind Of) Complete Woodstock: Sweetwater

    Traffic was the bane of Sweetwater’s existence.  Scheduled to open Woodstock, the band lost that slot to Richie Havens due to the traffic jams leading to the site.  Four months later lead singer Nancy Nevens was nearly killed by a drunk driver and left with brain damage and a damaged vocal cord.