KETCHUP: 30,000 Titles to Go...

Allman Brothers, LIVE AT THE ATLANTA INTERNATIONAL POP FESTIVAL 1970 (Epic/Legacy)
I haven't yet done a side-by-side comparison, but this strikes me as better than the more notorious Fillmore set, from guitar solos down to double-drumming grooves.

Simon and Garfunkel, BRIDGE OVER TROUBLED WATER (Legacy)
If the planets line up just so, hoping to boast a new SACD/DVD-A player soon, but these current remasters are trippy enough. I'm a detail man, and little things like the pedaling to the title song of this overplayed, overhyped, overwhatever record can get me going. Except for Halee's determined SCHLOCK factor (mostly strings), this holds up nicely, especially the out-of-the-way numbers like "Keep the Customer Satisfied," "Baby Driver," "Why Don't You Write Me" (HORNS!). And with this purview, you gotta like Simon's international forays (like "El Condor Pasa") better than what came later. But are they worth the expensive ticket price? Could be...considering his lawyer showed up in court.

Flaming Groovies, "She's Falling Apart," from FLAMINGO
This came on my iPod at random today, and it put me in the mind of Consonant's LOVE AND AFFLICTION (Fenway), which is inexcusably missing from my 2003 list.

Conley's old-schoolers, Burma, have a new CD coming out right about the time Fever hits the stands. Koinky-dink?

QUOTE OF THE WEEK: Roger Ailes, in the New York Daily News: Lloyd Grove dines with Al Franken at Michael's, where they run into Fox News chairman Ailes--who offers a variety of lame excuses for the network's embarrassing lawsuit from last summer that helped make Franken's book a big bestseller.

Excuse #1: "I can tell you that it was August, and I was on vacation. I think I said, 'Let's send this over to the legal department,' and somebody there must have thought that meant sue. That's not what it meant."

Excuse #2 (on whether it was all Bill O'Reilly's idea): "Let me put it this way: It wasn't my idea - and it wasn't the legal department's. Listen, talent always wants to sue about everything. ... It's the sort of thing that happens in August."