Andyland, USA

The evening was tense, and the air was heated. She looked at me, I looked at her. Sweat was heavy on my brow as I made my move. Slow and calculated, I took my time. R-A-T, I set the three letter tiles down on the Scrabble board right next to the bottom S in her SMARTS she had just played. Yes, RATS was the best I could do. She chuckled as she noted my amazing score of six on the score pad. I was loosing, she has a score of 239, and I had a score of now 86. “How is it you write, yet you’re so terrible at Scrabble?” she asked. “It’s one of the great mysteries of our time, a full segment will be devoted to the topic on ’60 Minutes’ sometime shortly.” I told her. It still baffles me, and anyone who has ever played Scrabble with me. Scrabble, Boggle, and any type of word search game I’m not great at. Yet give me a word association game, like that old beat up “$25,000 Pyramid” home game I still drag to parties, and I’m golden. “Pardon me, I’m going to run to the bathroom.” She excus...

Having dinner with your friends should be an enjoyable experience. It shouldn't be a night of good food and smart conversation that is ruined by awkward comments. I met my friends for dinner on a Friday at seven. The restaurant was full, but not overwhelmingly so. As our waiter came over and took our drink orders, all was fine, we were making idle chatter while going over the menu. When the waiter returned I wasn't sure what I wanted, so I asked for a recommendation. “For you I'd suggest something from the lighter menu” they said, as they moved on to taking the order of the person to my right. A silence passed among us after the waiter left, we were looking at each other, then I spoke “Was that a dig at my weight?” As we thought about it, we came to the conclusion that it was. Odd, but we were super happy about the food coming, so we carried on with our rousing chatter. When the waiter came back to re-fill our drinks, they once again did another awkward attempt...

Two weeks ago, Apple launched their new streaming service, Apple Music. Apple Music is built on the backbone of Beats Music—the streaming service that the popular headphone company launched last Winter--which Apple bought last year--and also was a service I was a subscriber of. So upon the day that Apple Music rolled out, I gladly rolled my account on over and began a three month trial of Apple Music. There's things about Apple Music that I really like, and there's things about Apple Music that I really hate. There's also things about streaming music in general that makes me feel weird, but we'll talk about that later on. First, let's talk about what I like. Because Apple Music is built off of Beats Music, the core of the service is very familiar to me. Curators, Apple Music Editors, and Activity sections, all of which contain playlists that have been curated by their music editors—actual, human music nerds making playlists for people. By in large, th...

Due to recent events, you may have found yourself having to do some thinning out of your friends list on Facebook. You either unfollowed someone, or you outright unfriended them. Facebook, mercifully, doesn't tell someone that you've unfriended/unfollowed them. It leaves it for them on their own time to discover the cruel fate that you have bestowed upon them. Sometimes, however, I think it might not be a bad idea for Facebook to allow you to fill out a form letter to tell the other person why you felt a need to un them. Much like a customer satisfaction survey, all you would do is click whichever button applies to that particular case, and it would inform the other party your reasons. Think of it as a way of helping them to be more aware of the world around them. It would simply tell them that they had been unned, and not reveal which one of their former devotees did the uning. Allow me to show how this form letter would look from vantage point of the person doing th...

“Walk On By” by Dionne Warwick: Burt Bacharach and Hal David are two of the giants of American songwriting. They have a place right up there with the best of the best of American writers. I'd go as far as to say they're the Gershwins of the rock and roll era. “Walk On By” is quintessential Bacharach and David, everything that makes them so lauded can be found in this song. The arrangement, the sound of the record, it's all here.  “My World Fell Down” By Sagittarius: If someone played this for you with no context, you'd think it was a “Good Vibrations” era Beach Boys outtake. There's good reason why you'd think that, Sagittarius wasn't an actual band, it was a studio group put together by producer Gary Usher (who co-wrote a few songs with Brian Wilson, including “In My Room). The group was backed by The Wrecking Crew, and featured Terry Melcher, actual Beach Boy Bruce Johnston, and a lead vocal performed by—wait for it—Glenn Campbell (who was act...

Here it is universe, the 100 songs I feel everyone should hear before they die. I went with my gut, and only allowed myself one song per artist. Not always going with the obvious choices either. I'll be explaining why these songs over the next few months in my column. To make everyone happy, and for those who wish to follow along, I've made the list as a Spotify playlist. The only caveat is the Spotify list is missing two songs, due to the limitations of their catalog (Sledgehammer & Ticket to Ride). Link to it is below the list. Enjoy! Note: this list is in no particular order, even though it is numbered. Walk On By - Dionne Warwick My World Fell Down — Sagittarius  God Only Knows — The Beach Boys The Boulevard of Broken Dreams— Tony Bennett One for my Baby — Frank Sinatra Lush Life — John Coltrane & Johnny Hartman Good Golly Miss Molly — Little Richard Johnny B. Goode — Chuck Berry Bo Diddley — Bo Diddley Rave On — Buddy Holly Rumble — Link Wray I’m ...

Record Store Day is this Saturday, and I’m really excited about it.  Even more than usual, I’m really looking forward to this year’s event. It has nothing to do with the exclusives, there’s only a handful of those I’m really want anyway. Considering all that has been going on in my life over the past two weeks, I’m just looking forward to a fun day of hitting up a whole bunch of record stores in Knoxville, which is where I’m going to spending RSD this year.  I know the whole limited runs thing has been a little wishy washy for people. I get that. A bunch of people show up to only get the limited editions, then mark them up on eBay. To me, those exclusives are not the reason I go out record shopping on Record Store Day. I go because I love record stores. I go because I love music. I don’t just like music, I don’t just have a small number of songs I like because they’re catchy and everyone else likes them. I love music in a way that is overwhelmingly deep. My love f...