We only had significant snowfall a couple of times this year but after the first one some friends of mine and I went for a walk through the neighborhood. I was amazed that during that entire trek we only came upon one snowman. I figured all of the kids must have been inside playing XBox.

R.E.M. Works On New Album, Shares In-Studio Photos By Austin L. Ray Studio photos by Vivian Johnson R.E.M. is working on a new album! Now, before you fanboys/girls get too excited, speculating as to whether or not the new offering will top Accelerate, pale in comparison to both the recent and forthcoming reissues, and so on, note that the band's currently amidst the "early, early demo days" for the album. All we know at the moment is where the band was recently recording and who it's been working with. David Bell from R.E.M's office sent Paste the following statement and photos: "This past week, Peter Buck and Mike Mills of R.E.M. spent a few days with producer Jacknife Lee in Portland's Jackpot Recording Studio. It is early, early demo days for the next record, which is still a ways away. Also involved last week were longtime confederates Bill Rieflin and Scott McCaughey, as well as noted engineer/producer Tucker Martine." Click here to see the photos.

Tim Easton Tuesday, May 12th Berkeley Cafe Raleigh, NC Great show last night with Tim backed by a full band (including Alex Livingstone on bass from Grand Champeen). This was my first time seeing him with a band so it was quite the different live experience. We still got some some acoustic numbers from him with and without the band, including an encore done from down in the audience.

Other than the initial reports of the prequel itself I didn't read any articles about Star Trek before seeing it.

Dex Romweber Teams with Jack White Limited edition 45 due late May. By Blurt Staff The Dex Romweber Duo recently met up with Jack White, and the summit yielded a new 7" scheduled to be released in late May on White's newly formed label, Third Man. Again and again over the years, Jack White has preached the Dex gospel. "Dex Romweber was and is a huge influence on my music. I owned all of his records as a teenager," Jack said. "[He is] one of the best kept secrets of the rock 'n' roll underground." 20 years ago, Dex's band, The Flat Duo Jets, were innovators, paving the way for contemporary guitar/drum duos like The Black Keys and The White Stripes. The session was a long time coming. In an interview with Metromix, Sara Romweber (drummer, Dex Romweber Duo,) described the scene. "At one point, Dex was in the room with his guitar and Jack was behind the control board. Jack had the biggest smile on his face and he said, "You have no idea how long I've waited to hear that guitar tone in my studio." You can read the rest of the article here.

I missed out on the first wave of skateboarding in the 60s but I do recall my older brothers and sister having roller skates with steel or clay wheels. By the time skateboarding came back around again in the early to mid-70s clay wheels were still in existence but thankfully someone had the bright idea for polyurethane wheels. That's the time period when I came onboard. I still have my old boards but haven't ridden them in years. My board of choice was the Gordon & Smith Fibreflex slalom model with the cutaway design. Of course the trucks were Tracker and the wheels were Kryptonic.

My memories of Gumby were forever tainted by Eddie Murphy's portrayal of him on SNL in his notorious "I'm Gumby, dammit!" skits. Speaking of those old claymation programs like Gumby there was also Davey & Goliath that used to air on Sunday mornings. The Cartoon Network's Adult Swim does a great parody of that with their program Moral Orel.

I was allowed to set up my lemonade stand at the golf course despite the fact that it had to cut into their sales. I also collected drink bottles which you could return for a deposit back then. As my friends and I got older, other ways to earn extra cash included turning in old batteries and metal parts at the scrapyard.

A parody or an homage?

The new album is streaming on Wilco's website now. Perfect timing especially considering the record leaked yesterday.

Kind of odd (or maybe not) that a chain like Best Buy would be one to pick up on the resurgence of vinyl sales but then again they've already been stocking quite a few titles on vinyl over the last year or so such as Pearl Jam, G n' R, Queen + Paul Rodgers, etc. Best Buy Turning the Tables With Vinyl

Yes, I do. On my copy it's listed as a Traditional tune "arranged by Jimmy Page". AllMusic.com credits the original songwriters as"Bennett, Bredon, Darling".

Tim Easton Porcupine Great show here in Raleigh tonight with a shoutout to locals Patty Hurst Shifter and Six String Drag (Kenny Roby) during one tune and Tim down in the audience solo/acoustic for the second encore. He also had vinyl versions of his new record on sale, 500 limited edition prints individually handpainted with unique artwork. If so inclined, you can check out some of his artwork here.

It's been my experience at this board that quite a few (but by all means not "all") Zeppelin fans are not fond of a lot of music unless it comes from the 60s or 70s and seem unreceptive to most anything outside of their comfort zone. There also seems to be an underlying desire for any new music to bare some sort of resemblance to Zeppelin for them to like it. Again, this doesn't go for all fans but I've encountered that attitude from quite a few of them. The ones that are into new music seem very few and far between.

How's it going "TypeO"? I have a fear this whole "ROCK ON" thing is catching on.

ZFF?

The gift shop section of Cracker Barrel carries a lot of vintage toys such as Wheelo's and Barrels of Monkeys.

If they play new music then it's not a "classic rock" station. I'm referring to stations that play the same songs by the same artists day in and day out. I'm not offended either but I do find it very disheartening when I encounter someone that believes there's actually a genre called "classic rock" when in reality, there's no such thing. I'm also not offended by "classic rock" radio itself. It's just that as someone that grew up in the 70s I've heard a great deal of that music ad nauseum already and at a time when many more other artists were also featured. In my area it got to the point a few years ago where the only choices on the radio were the local classic rock station and NPR. All due respect to Boston and their fans but there's only so many times one can stomach hearing More Than a Feeling (or even Whole Lotta Love for that matter) for the gazillionth time. That's when I said, fuck this and subscribed to satellite radio. It's not exactly the be all and end all either (especially since the merger) but it still offers way more choices than terrestrial radio.

There was never going to be any reunion beyond the 02 show. What was supposedly going to happen was a new band featuring Page, Jones and Jason Bonham with a singer that bore no resemblance vocally to Robert Plant. Apparently the plan was for this band to write and record new music and to tour behind it but according to Page's manager, the project was called off.

So music classified as "metal" isn't intelligent? AC/DC, like Chuck Berry before them rely on many of the same riffs but I don't think that means either artist lacks "real musical intelligence" nor do I believe metal itself lacks intelligence. Some rock n' roll (like that made by AC/DC and others) just chooses to go for the throat, something that lends that type of artist a very primitive quality, a quality that is the very essence of rock n' roll itself. It's also a quality Led Zeppelin had in droves, do think any real intelligence went into the lyrics of something like Whole Lotta Love besides the usual themes of rock n' roll? While Zeppelin definitely was more than a run of the mill band and proved that by being so versatile musically, I don't think that alone makes them (or any artist for that matter) "the best".

Because I prefer the days when rock n' roll radio actually played new music alongside the older stuff. Those stations still exist but they're few and far between. If Classic Rock radio is going to exist why not at least be inventive with it and play more than the same songs that have been played into the ground already? I'd love to see them take a hint from satellite radio who have broadened the spectrum to include much more than the tried and true and also expose many very worthwhile artists who may not have received their due the first time around. Another thing I absolutely abhor about Classic Rock radio is that it's created the misguided notion among some that there's actually a genre of music called "Classic Rock" when in fact there is no such genre, it's just a name thought up by a radio executive for a type of radio format.

I don't think classic rock radio was ever an important factor in where music is going. If anything it signaled a stagnation in radio programming in general but not the state of music itself. My main point being, I firmly believe people would still find out about Led Zeppelin with or without classic rock radio. Personally, it is one of the reasons I signed up for satellite radio several years ago.

That's awful nice of you but you don't have to. Really.

I blame the over abundance of grammatical and spelling errors these days in the print and web media on spellcheck. I think there's also probably less people doing more jobs which leads to not having the time to thoroughly proofread copy before it's published.