Karl 
LISTEN (AND WATCH), MY FRIENDS, as the late Mike Douglas introduces Moby Grape playing “Omaha.” Plus, we have the band playing “Hey Grandma,” “Sitting By The Window” and “Sweet Ride (Never Again).” The band was largely a victim of corporate overhype and Skip Spence's madness, but that self-titled debut album is really solid.
ARTHUR LEE continues to be memorialized, more personally by songwriter Paul K in Giant magazine, with an appreciation of Forever Changes (with embedded video) at PopMatters that suggests the LA bands had a much grittier view of the Summer of Love than the Fan Francisco hippie contingent.
THE LONG WINTERS: At Chromewaves, Frank enthusiastically hooks you up to interviews, audio and video of a band he classifies as power-pop, but which I would compare more to the poppier side of the Jayhawks or Wilco. Which is still a pretty good thing. You can find even more via the Hype Machine, as Frank is not the only blogger jazzed over the band. You can select single tracks or click on a media player at the top for a streaming jukebox.
NEKO CASE recommends comedy, music and media to The New York Times, including the documentary We Jam Econo: The Story of the Minutemen. She also reccommends a disc from the Eccentric Soul series, which I second.
INSIDE THE ROCKERS STUDIO: To ceelebrate the deluxe reissue of Sebadoh III, Stereogum asks ten questions of Lou Barlow and Eric Gaffney. MP3s at the link, too.
MOUNTAIN GOATS frontman John Darnielle talks to the Athens Exchange about touring and the state of the world: “Oh, it's sorry, but it's always been sorry: everybody always thinks 'this age is the worst age ever,' most religions sorta bank on that whole 'this must be the end!' feeling but where you've got people you're gonna have awful quarreling. That's just the way the world is, all you can do is try to keep your little corner of it friendly, maybe encourage a few other people to think what they can't do to do the same thing.” He then seems to have given a drunken, impovisational performance worthy of the Replacements in their day. But he seems sober in the new video for “Woke Up New,” from the Goats' forthcoming Get Lonely.
BEST LIVE BANDS: Brooklyn Vegan posts SPIN magazine's Top Ten as target practice for his readership.
ISOBEL CAMPBELL claims her her Mercury Prize nomination has her bad luck, self-doubt and disillusionment with the music industry. But she will probably attend the ceremony, lest her label kill her. You can stream some of her acclaimed collaboration with Mark Lanegan through MySpace and the Hype Machine.
JAMES BROWN wins an appeal of a sexual harassment case dismissed based on the statute of limitations.
BRYAN FERRY is back in style, according to London's Independent; “At 60, the enduring 'face' of Roxy Music provides an object lesson in the art of growing old elegantly…”
BRITNEY SPEARS moaning about being “ugly,” belching and rambling about time travel has become a video hit on the internet, according to London's Sun.
WEEKEND BOX OFFICE: Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby took a second victory lap, with the dance romance Step Up providing unexpected competition (though trend was down over the weekend. The foiled air terror plot seems to have dampened interest in Oliver Stone's World Trade Center, which is as moving as its glowing reviews suggest, though this may be inherent in the subject. It's a great reminder of the way people came together after 9/11, though it says nothing about the larger issues before or after that date. The other new releases, Pulse and Zoom, placed fifth and seventh.
JESSICA BIEL, Esquire magazine's reigning “Sexiest Woman Alive,” reportedly got carried away enough at the Lotus nightclub to plant a big old smooch on an attractive female companion. Her rep denies it, natch.
IS THIS A BLIND ITEM? It involves a Very Famous Unmarried Hollywood Actor Prone To Starting Litigation If His Sexuality Is Ever Questioned. And spanking.
TOM-KAT UPDATE: Holmes has embarked on a strict exercise plan to get ready for the new Batman film, including yoga and kickboxing.
THE ODD GWYNETH PALTROW public service announcement posted here Friday is drawing a lot of Photoshop fun on the internet.
LINDSAY LOHAN may get booted from the Chateau Marmont for her excessive partying. The hotel's rep denies it. It would be bad timing for Lohan, who now has her very own stalker.
JESSICA SIMPSON: The pneumatic blonde gets a verbal smackdown from Reese Witherspoon: “My grandma did not fight for what she fought for, just so you can start telling women it's fun to be stupid.”
THE FRENCH HOTEL was reportedly attacked by her pet kinkajou, though the kinkajou denies it. Ever the animal lover, the heiress has bought the plot next to Marilyn Monroe's grave to bury her pet goat. Yet Hilton (and her ilk) get a a tongue-lashing from Lost hottie Evangeline Lily: “”Those people couldn't give a rat's ass if somebody was starving in the street next to them.”
HEIDI KLUM vs. ELLE MACPHERSON: A new Victoria's Secret ad campaign is having Klum call herself “The Body” — a title long claimed by fellow supermodel Elle Macpherson. This sort of dispute is ideally suited to be settled by Jell-O wrestling, except that Klum is pregnant again. Having just pointed folks to Klum's recent Esquire layout on Friday, I must also point you to these recent pics of Macpherson in the Caribbean, just in the interest of fairness.
REVENGE OF THE GREEN HELMET: Last Friday, I linked to German TV video of a man known as “Green Helmet” staging photos at Qana. The AP, rather than conceding the point, has responded by running a glowing profile of Salam Daher (in which he is suddenly dressed in a blue helmet and flak jacket like those worn by the press) and telling a columnist that “Partisans on both sides of a conflict will interpret images of that conflict in different ways. AP strives to stick to the facts.” Really? The AP reported inflated casualty numbers from Qana, then did an elaborate tapdance to explain it away. Salam Daher provided these phony numbers. Indeed, the AP's hero seemingly provided an alias to the AP at the time, yet they relay his accounts as though they are not suspect. The AP's photo captions in no way suggested that photos were being staged in the manner shown by the video. The AP suggests that the displaying of corpses is not unusual in the Middle East, though an Egyptian blogger openly mocks that explanation. The display of corpses is not unusual among groups seeking a propaganda advantage, but the AP should not be involved in passing along staged photos without telling viewers what they are seeing. The L.A. Times and international photogs are taking this issue a bit more seriously. Meanwhile, the blog that identified the doctored Reuters photo now has a piece from someone who purportedly worked for AP Television News claiming that the AP's lucrative side deal with Arabic media skews their entire operation.
MIDEAST CONFLICT: Pajamas Media carried a report via Tom Harb of the World Lebanese Cultural Union, purporting to describe the internal struggles at the Lebanese Council of Ministers’ meeting that delayed approval of a cessation of the conflict. Michael J. Totten blogged and photographed from the “free-fire zone” in Israel.
AIR TERROR FALLOUT: With Britain carrying out some two dozen serious investigations into suspected terrorist groups, in the midst of the investigation of a plot that may have included using a baby's bottle to hold a liquid explosive, a letter to the Prime Minister from British Muslim groups calling for “urgent” changes to UK foreign policy seems to have backfired, as Tony Blair's Ministers and even the editors of London's Guardian respond that British Muslim leaders need to do more to deter terrorism (much to the chagrin of some of the paper's readers). The Guardian and the Times recognize the need to court more sensible Muslims; after all last week's big bust started with a tip from a worried Muslim. But if Secretary of State for Communities Ruth Kelly thinks terrorists can only be defeated by national unity, she should note the recent poll showing that 81 percent of British Muslims consider themselves Muslims first, with only seven percent seeing themselves as Britons first.
A KANGAROO in China is thought to be the first to have an artificial limb.
MYSTERY BEASTS: People on a northern Manitoba reserve are avoiding a lake after three sled dogs were gutted amid reports that a strange creature is on the loose. In the French town of Boulogne-sur-Mer, scores of policemen — some armed with shotguns — are hunting a mysterious big black feline. An animal resembling the hyenas in the Lion King has been spotted in northern Minnesota.
KILLER SQUIRREL UPDATE: Following Friday's report from the UK is a story of a squirrel that attacked at least seven people in Winter Park, FL this month.
PETS may get legal protection in domestic abuse cases, if domestic violence support groups and animal welfare advocates are successful.
THREE PITBULLS unleashed to “cause some excitement” do exactly that in Kansas City, MO.
