I saw Liz Phair on the Tavis Smiley Show this week (thanks to the wonders of TiVo), and it turns out her song, “Table for One,” isn’t autobiographical, but biographical:
Tavis: You like taking on really ambitious projects. I mean, “Exile in Guyville� huge, massive undertaking, response to the Stones. I mean, where do you come up with these ideas?
 Phair: They’re really natural to me, and I never got to finish my Stevie Wonder project. And really, it’s kind of one of those sadnesses in my life where I would have liked to have finished that, but that was such an epic record. It was so much to undertake, and the more I got into it, the more it became this kind of, I was missing some of the really important songs like, “Isn’t She Lovely?â€? That was a really hard one to come up with. Something from my own life that would be sort of equivalent.
Like, I don’t try to imitate anyone. But it helps me make a record. ‘Cause I don’t really naturally know how to make records. So I kind of, I go to school. I take on an artist who’s phenomenal, and I try to go to their school. And that’s the way that I look at it. Like for me on this record, I have a song about my brother’s alcoholism called “Table for One,â€? and that was my Village Ghetto Land, because Village Ghetto Land to me is the most devastating song on the record.
It’s kind of bringing dignity to sort of the least appreciated part of life. It’s like shining a spotlight on the invisible and downtrodden. And I kind of tried to look at my own life, and see what was the most devastating thing that I witnessed, or that I thought went unsung in a weird way, and it was, for me, the loneliness that my brother would have felt and like the bottom, when he bottomed out.
He’s sober since then, but that’s sort of how I would do it. I would look at what he wrote about, and I’d think about what in my own life, you know, mirrors this sentiment.
She also waxed enthusiastic about her weekly podcast, Uplands, which is available through her site or via your podcasting software of choice.
Peter, my editor, has made the leap and now has his own blog. Unlike me, he does editorials, so he can feel free to express any sort of opinion that he’d express on the editorial page (which is most of them).
- Although I can’t find the non-ugly URL (Yahoo’s new 360 blogs still have a lot of kinks that need ironing out), former Hesperia Star advertising representative Rodney Lambert also has a blog.
It’s so crazy, it must be true:
Among a fringe community of paranoids, aluminum helmets serve as the protective measure of choice against invasive radio signals. We investigate the efficacy of three aluminum helmet designs on a sample group of four individuals. Using a $250,000 network analyser, we find that although on average all helmets attenuate invasive radio frequencies in either directions (either emanating from an outside source, or emanating from the cranium of the subject), certain frequencies are in fact greatly amplified. These amplified frequencies coincide with radio bands reserved for government use according to the Federal Communication Commission (FCC). Statistical evidence suggests the use of helmets may in fact enhance the government’s invasive abilities. We theorize that the government may in fact have started the helmet craze for this reason.
Hey, they’re from MIT. They must be right.
Hankering for more Buffy the Vampire Slayer from Joss Whedon? I know I am, because I actually found myself TiVoing Angel, a television show with a demon who owns a karaoke bar.
The good news is that there is more official-if-that-matters Buffy coming:
Speaking of Darkhorse Comics, they are starting a new Buffy comic, and as I understand it, it will take place after the end of Buffy and Angel and be canon in the Buffy world. And I understand it that way ’cause I’M WRITING IT. I’m kicking off the book with a four issue arc that finds Buffy — you guessed it — living in Italy with The Immortal. (Scott — don’t be mad I spoiled the announcement — saying it means I have to finish it.) Then I’ll be overseeing the book more closely, to make sure it remains true. Gonna be interesting. And it just might tie in to…
The infamous Spike movie. Still haven’t finalized anything, but I feel that very soon I’ll be able to go to James and say something a lot more interesting than “Wouldn’t it be cool if…” ‘Course, I just hope he’s free some time this decade. See how my peeps is all actifying! Tomorrow night is AMIAS, (that’s alias with Acker in it.) Happy. And totally jealous.
See, the Buffyverse glows in my brain with a new, overreaching arc that will include the comics, Spike, and more. It’s taking shape and soon you will know its name. And you will tremble.
Then of course there’s a little thing called X-Men, who are apparantly supposed to become astonishing again real soon. I miss me my Cassiday. Can’t wait to see the fan response when I kill Wolverine and replace him with fan-fave Marrow.
Well, I certainly can’t say much more, except that Wonder Woman is finally kicking ass that is not my ass, as in, I’m loving this script. She’s saving the world in a tiara, people; this is why there’s a me!
Someone needs to introduce Joss to decaf, just after he polishes off the Buffy comic book story and turns in the Wonder Woman movie script.
 To help promote the show during November sweeps, ABC will be distributing podcasts relating to Lost all this month. The first one is an interview teasing tonight’s episode, “Abandoned.” This is a pretty clever thing for ABC to do, in my opinion, since the auxillary Lost Web sites have shown the series’ audience is already pretty much online and techie.
It’s a little surprising the podcast doesn’t have video with it — how hard would it have been to stick the two people talking on stools in front of a Lost backdrop and just film it? — but maybe later, or next year.
If you don’t have iTunes or use other podcasting software, you can hear the podcast as streaming audio on the official site.
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