My Top Five R.E.M. Songs (Almost a month later) And Two Great, Great Albums I Recently Had Written Off and Vending with the Von Trapps.

My Top 5 (6, actually--there's a three way tie for 4th) R.E.M. songs based on iTunes play count*:

• Exhuming McCarthy
• Country Feedback
• I've Been High
• Fall On Me
• What's the Frequency Kenneth?
• How the West Was Won and Where it Got Us

I'm always surprised when I look at play counts. Two songs I would've thought would have been on the list: Nightswimming and Swan Swan H.

*I loaded my songs onto this computer 5/16/07 so it's been counting since then.

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There are two albums that were released last year that are quickly becoming two of my favorites: Sky Blue Sky and Boxer. I know I totally wrote both of them off at the end of 2007 but I never write anything completely off. It's a good thing too. I think SBS (Sky Blue Sky) is Wilco's strongest album to date. I love YHF but SBS is so tight and stong and concrete it's just magical. They make it sound so so so so so easy. In fact, it pisses me off how easy they make it sound. It just taunts me whenever I listen to it. "Hey, freaker, look what I can do. Ha. You're sitting there at a desk, and I'm making magic! Look how easy it is to be me! Look how easy! And people love me! I was nominated for best Rock album! I didn't win but no one can take that nomination away from me! NO ONE!"

Boxer is different. Boxer kills me with subtleties. It's a chord change or a word or a phrase or the way he sings something or the timing of the percussion or the string arrangements of a particular song. There are moments I listen for. Fractions of songs. And the sentiments at the foundations of the songs devastate me--distance, loss, space, how one relates to the world outside oneself. But the songs are so striking. So poignant. They resonate.

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I ordered an AMFM cd from Austria. It cost me $11. Total. Eleven dollars. Pretty cheap, right? The cd was $8 and shipping to the U.S. was $3. Well that was two and a half weeks ago. I'm thinking shipping was so cheap because they sent the cd on a freakin helium filled balloon. Or carrier pigeon. Or Austrian gypsy. Or basal wood airplane. Or newspaper boat. Or remote controlled car. Or worse yet--I got ripped off by some corrupt Von Trapp who had no intention of sending me my cheap-yet-difficult-to-find cd. I'm cursing you Austria. I'm cursing!