So here I am, linking to a piece they wrote about Stereo/Mono.

No worries, Westernerds, I totally encouraged the writer to go listen to Suicaine Gratifaction as soon as possible.

If’n you need a place you wanna plug your Westerberg/Replacements thoughts you are welcome here. I have zero dollars and zero cents to offer anyone, but I’ll happily link to your work or post it here if you want. It’d be nice to read what other people have to say about their music.

via Slim Dunlap’s long, difficult recovery inspires star-studded Songs for Slim project | Local Current Blog | The Current from Minnesota Public Radio.

I love Can’t Hardly Wait (I have 26 versions of it in my iTunes, and that’s only because I am too lazy to go cherry pick the song out of the rest of the bootlegs laying around). It’s in the all-time top three Holy Triumvirate of iconic ‘Mats songs (along with Left of the Dial and a song that I usually slot in depending on my mood).

Go read the discussion, you’ll be happy you did.

I’m not gonna tell you which song it was. However, I did really like this side note:
* On a side note, I fucking love The Replacements, and prolly the biggest compliment I ever received was from Tommy himself. He really likes jackass, and one time in a bar he said, “If my brother Bob were still alive he would have loved it, too.” Man, that made me happy then and it makes me happy now.

Comedy Central has a list of the Five Funniest Replacements Songs. Oddly enough, “Tommy Gets His Tonsils Out” and “Gary’s Got a Boner” are not on the list.

DFactor points out that Tommy’s got second billing on the Chinese Democracy myspace page. You can also listen to a stream of the album. Are you gonna buy it?

Wild Tyme has a good piece on Our Man Paul’s 49:00.

The Current’s Musicheads are making a list of singers who aren’t “good” but who you love anyway. Check the comments to see who made the list (I did not make the list).

And another thing, that poll over there ——> there is a ONE VOTE DIFFERENCE. I think in the spirit of all things Minnesota, we should have a recount. What say ye?

Jim Walsh has nice conversation with Chris Mars about art and his fabulous book Tolerance.

In case you missed it in the comments, you can hear our own DFactor covering Color Me Impressed.

Also from the comments, Useless Doug points us to his treatise on TV on the Radio, pop music and The Replacements.

MN Speakers weigh in on their favorite Minnesotans. I did not make the list.

Seems Our Man Paul helped Rolling Stone pick the 100 Greatest Singers of All Time. I did not make that list either.

The Beat Patrol has posted a 1993 article by Ira Robbins: Paul Westerberg Comes in from the Ledge.

There ain’t much going on in blogland. Jim Walsh wrote about Chris Mar’s Tolerance for the MinnPost and Aquarium Drunkard has a phenomenal write up of the Sire-years reissues. And about 1000 vacuous bloggers put their iPods on shuffle and randomly listed 10 songs without any context whatsoever.

Go read a book. I’ve just started Juliana Hatfield’s memoir When I Grow Up (thanks to her publisher for sending it to me). It will probably make it into the Westerberg Bookclub. I’m only 15 pages in and she’s already mentioned the ‘Mats.

What are you reading?

Our own Zook ran across this article in the Jersey Beat about the reissues and said it was nice to see someone talking about Don’t Tell a Soul. I haven’t read it because I am too busy making my award-winning chili.

Everybody and their sister have reviewed the recent reissues, here are a few:
Blurt
Dusted
iF Magazine
The Boston Phoenix

I’ve been reading a lot about Jeremy Messersmith and I have yet to actually listen to his music (because I am laaazzy), but I did catching this little bitty snippet of Skyway:

That’s all I got this week, because I’m much too something today to be in the mood to read through 39,396 iPod shuffle lists to find any real content.

Ted Barron the photographer who took the picture of Our Man Paul and Alex Chilton featured in the liner notes for the re-issued Pleased to Meet Me talks about the night the picture was taken.