AMC's Rubicon. A fascinatingly analog Parallax View/3 Days of the Condor-style paranoia thriller about the War on Terror. Features a great supporting role by the late Christopher Evan Welch and characters named "Kale Ingram" and "Truxton Spangier."

"this silksong boss is so hard" and a pic is posted and this is the boss i see

My Letterboxd is fundamentally incomplete this year because there's no entry for me to log the 45 times I've watched the Counting Batty Bats episode of Sesame Street.

New King of the Hill is making me miss: 1) when animated shows had ludicrously talented, non-celebrity voice actors, 2) when broad, powerful swaths of society did not resemble Dale Gribble.

I'm listening to Mahler's 7th symphony, and I feel like I would have gotten into classical a lot earlier if someone had nudged me and said "This is where Star Trek music comes from"

We had to enforce the "do not come to our concert just to boo us" rule on the D&R Patreon this week, and I gotta say it was pretty satisfying.

Remember to do your part by replying to strangers about how there will never be another election and the rule of law doesn’t matter. You’re definitely helping the resistance.

Just stopped everything I was doing and put on Pet Sounds in the kitchen. I knew on some level that this was coming, but it's still going to take a while for this to sink in. So much of why I love music, why I became obsessed with music goes back to Brian Wilson (and his collaborators).

I had it in my memory that 30 Rock seriously fell off after season 2, but upon rewatch, it turns out it was consistently hysterical and I was just extremely AV Club-pilled in my 20s

Imagine being killed by a bow and arrow. That would suck. An arrow killed you, they would never solve the crime. "Look at that dead guy. Let's go that way."

What actor's expression in a movie will stay with you for the rest of your life?

Appreciating the following bright spots in this dark timeline: 1) Walton Goggins is now famous enough to host SNL 2) My 2-year-old is walking around saying "Concwave!"

Whenever I meet a new person, I take a moment and mentally categorize them as either a "Linnell" or a "Flansburgh"

Your Pope name is: Last thing you ate + number of letters in your first name — Pope Mapo Tofu VII

Listened to the Magnetic Fields' 69 Love Songs today for the first time since we did our big triple feature on D&R. The hit-to-miss ratio is absurdly good, and the interesting-to-uninteresting ratio is a complete blowout.

Most of the characters on this show are very funny variations on the actors' other roles, but Judy Gemstone is an amazing, completely sui generis comic creation on Edi Patterson's part.

I’m being sincere when I say I think not having this type of thing in our lives anymore because of the loss of hyperlocal journalism is part of our disconnection from each other as communities. This is the type of low-stakes neighborhood thing we used to talk and laugh about.

Honored and excited to be part of the @makeaplanetpod.bsky.social team!

It's been a while since I left the SF Examiner but if there is one civic lesson I took away from that experience it is that Newsom is a fucking tool.

The Knife - Silent Shout (2006): What a cool-sounding album. Like the whole thing is gliding on ice, but you can only see the parts where the song makes landfall, illuminated in neon. #SynesthesiaCorner

The value of art IS that a human made it -- each decision, each thought, all the hours learning craft to get to that point, every way the making has changed the maker. It's why, even though AI may have uses (promising medical applications for one), AI art is essentially valueless.

I got on the exercise bike to find that my wife had added this new user, and this is why we're married.

Other than the Dylan movie I am in full-on "raising a 2-year-old" mode. #LastFourWatched

Finally went back and cleared all of my Goodreads star ratings, because it was disproportionately bothering me that 2009 me rated Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire four stars and The Canterbury Tales three stars

The Sopranos is the most layered, discerning piece of art about America as a concept that I have ever seen and it is not a particularly close race.

After yesterday's economic news, I stood at a crossroads, and ultimately chose joy over fiscal responsibility.

The Keene Brothers - Blues and Boogie Shoes (2006): If you're intimidated by the size of the Robert Pollard discography, just remember that something like 80% of it is catchy, Who-influenced arena rock. This collaboration with the late power pop songwriter Tommy Keene is a great place to start.

Boosting: if you use a public library in the US and use Libby, Hoopla, or interlibrary loan, or have family and friends who do- that funding may be gone as IMLS is dismantled by DOGE. 🗃️

"Mr. Burns has a son voiced by Rodney Dangerfield, and dislikes him because he behaves like Rodney Dangerfield" is a much sturdier comic premise than I remembered.

For TV it's often a really sharp and left-field music supervision decision. Like Tony Soprano walking out to get his morning paper to "World Destruction" by Time Zone, at the start of the show's first post-9/11 season.

Reading the excellent 2021 book Music Is History by @questlove.bsky.social. There's a whole chapter about how many dance/funk songs are in E minor, a very difficult key for bassists, specifically because of Sly's "Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)," and now I'll never unhear it.

Every headline for the last four months

Lady Gaga - Mayhem (2025): It occurred to me that chronologically, Lady Gaga is in her Ray of Light period, which, just put me in a coffin already. Appropriately enough, this song slaps.

It’s the best thing they’ve done since Wish and it’s brutal. All dirty bass and drums. Tender and honest as well. The Cure at their best sound like a thunderstorm raging around a besweatered man crying for the sun while enjoying the rain.

The Cure - Songs for a Lost World (2024): This sort of reminds me of the most recent Peter Gabriel in that there's no audible wear and tear at all on Robert Smith's voice. It's like he never left.

I'm trying to figure out what to write for my first post, but this is 90% of the content in my brain right now, and it's crowding out everything else.