Had director Garry Marshall consulted me during the postproduction editing stage of Pretty Woman, the film would have ended with Julia Roberts’ lovable hooker Vivian being driven away from the Beverly Wilshire to the strains of Roxette’s “It Must Have Been Love”. We would also have seen the wonderfully empty Richard Gere’s emotionally distant corporate raider Edward standing on a Wilshire balcony, mourning the loss of the only woman he ever truly loved, or at least the only one he ever paid three grand to fuck for a week.

Fade to black. Cut. Print. Roll credits.

Oh, no, you say, not so fast, Cecil B. DeSmitty. You want the fairy tale, just like Vivian tells Edward before that particular montage. Lots of people wanted the fairy tale. Garry Marshall certainly wanted the fairy tale, and instead of a relatively reasonable ending to a film with a decidedly unreasonable premise, we got Sir Edward riding in to “save” Princess Vivian from turning her life around on her own terms, whisking her away to be his well-cared-for trophy wife forever and ever, amen.

I suppose it would be extra curmudgeonly of me to insist on my alternate ending, but here’s the thing: it was a great, all-too-brief montage. The melancholy look on Vivian’s face as the car drives off; the way she bugs her eyes out to keep from crying, then looks back anyway; the super-vacant way Edward peers over the balcony—these were the realest reactions in the entire movie. And they were set to the most heartbreaking of lost-love anthems, that wonderful Roxette track, whose opening verse so perfectly sets the tone of loneliness, both present and impending:

Lay a whisper on my pillow
Leave the winter on the ground
I wake up lonely, there’s air of silence
In the bedroom and all around
Touch me now, I close my eyes and dream away
It must have been love but it’s over now

It was the highlight of the film’s soundtrack, a Number One hit by arguably the most popular band in the world at that moment. The album, like the movie, was a smash, peaking at Number Four during at 91-week run on the album chart, selling over three million copies in the process.

While Roxette provided the biggest hit on the record, there was no shortage of solid pop music therein. Go West contributed the most excellent “King of Wishful Thinking,” a Top Ten hit in its own right, with its bouncy, immediately memorable chorus. Go-Go Jane Wiedlin gave us “Tangled,” a tasty pop confection that stands at the top of her solo work. Both were radio-friendly songs of a mighty high order.

What would an almost-’80s soundtrack be without a love ballad from Peter Cetera? “No Explanation” might not have had a jaw-droppingly geeky video to push it to the VH-1 crowd, but it works as a piece of soundtrack fluff. I’m also partial to Lauren Wood’s “Fallen,” which accompanied the scene in which Edward takes Vivian to the opera (who could forget that plane-flying-at-sunset shot, or the too-brief San Francisco at night shot? If Garry Marshall had consulted me, both would have been considerably longer). Wood’s previous claim to fame was a song called “Please Don’t Leave,” a duet with, you guessed it —

There are some clunkers here, too. Natalie Cole’s vanilla “Wild Women Do” sounds anything but wild, and the damn thing kicks off the album. It’s followed by an ill-conceived remix of “Fame” by David Bowie (this was, after all, his Tin Machine/Glass Spider period, when he pretty much pissed on his past whenever possible). And why the soundtrack folks used Christopher Otcasek anemic cover of Johnny O’Keefe’s “Real Wild Child (Wild One)” instead of Iggy Pop’s much cooler version is beyond comprehension.

All in all, though, the prototypical ’90s chick flick had a damn fine soundtrack record to accompany it. I just wish I’d have been asked about that ending.  On second thought, perhaps this one works better:

In the present, Pippa Lee (Wright) is the loving wife and caretaker to retired book publisher, Herb Lee (Arkin). She is also the mother of two adult children, Ben, who respects her for all that she’s done for the family, and Grace, who resents her mom because she sees Pippa as a woman who never took any chances in life.  Herb, a refined, educated man, is thirty years older than Pippa. After three heart attacks, his doctors have insisted he take it easy. As the film opens, Herb and Pippa have relocated to a quiet retirement community.

The move has unsettled Pippa and she questions whether she’s having a nervous breakdown, as she finds herself sleepwalking and conducting odd behavior. Pippa begins to recount pivotal moments in her life, flashing back to her early childhood when she was the only daughter in a family of six.  The young Pippa becomes the confidant and friend to her struggling mother, Suky, who manages to maintain a crazed household by popping pills. As Suky, Maria Bello, the exceptional actress from The Cooler and A History of Violence, continues to prove that she’s one of this generation’s great actresses. In Suky, Bello gives us a woman whose spirit is slowly being depleted by the expectations placed upon her to be a dutiful housewife, good mom, and to keep a thin figure. Suky leans on Pippa, a role that the youngster relishes until she realizes that her mom is an addict.

By this point, Pippa is a teenager and being played by Blake Lively. When Pippa can’t handle her mother anymore, she runs away from home and begins a series of misadventures that include a stay with her aunt and her lover, played by Robin Weigert and Julianne Moore, respectively. Weigert, who has done a great deal of work on television (most notably her tragic turn as Calamity Jane on Deadwood), brings a great deal of soul and warmth to her small, pivotal role. Countering that warmth is Moore’s character, a cold, manipulative artist who uses Pippa for her own gain and gets the poor girl kicked out on the streets. Pippa’s life spirals into an endless period of drugs and partying until she meets Herb at a beach party and the two eventually fall in love. Lively captures the stoned, lost characterization of Pippa perfectly and shows more range than she’s allowed on her hit TV series.

Miller intercuts between the past and the present, using visual cues in the present to trigger a flashback. In the here and now, Pippa begins a friendship with, Chris, a divorce played by Reeves, in a role that suits his dramatic strengths. I’ve always felt that Reeves is a strong actor when a) playing a particular role (i.e. a laid back stoner-esque slacker/surfer dudes) and b) he doesn’t have to carry the movie. As he did in Something’s Gotta Give a few years ago, Reeves adds depth to his role and proves to be a perfect acting partner for Wright.

Chris has moved in with his parents at the same retirement community where Pippa and Herb live. He works at a late night convenience store, which is where he gets to know Pippa after she sleepwalks into the store one night. The two of them are kindred spirits, lost in the country and at a crossroads in their lives. Laid back and cool, Chris is the polar opposite of Herb, and although Pippa does nothing to further the relationship past being friendship, she slowly falls in love with him.

Robin Wright’s performance in The Private Lives of Pippa Lee is funny, sad, and mysterious; it is also one of the strongest I’ve seen this year. Wright has a reputation for playing tough, independent woman. In this film she is a woman who has given up her independence, which has weakened her.  Pippa has slowly become the woman she never wanted to be: Suky, her mother. Therefore, Pippa’s journey is one of reawakening and Wright’s performance is so subtle and wonderful you won’t want to miss it.

Although Miller’s screenplay is slightly flawed (the period in which Pippa conforms to Herb’s world is glossed over with voice over narration), the film is still a strong enough work to merit watching. Besides the acting, Declan Quinn’s cinematography is lovely to watch and Sabine Hoffman’s editing is seamless, especially the transitions from the past to the present. There are now wavy lines or dissolves to announce, “We’re going back in time.” Instead, the camera pans or dollies and in the camera move, the transition between time periods takes place. This is similar to the technique used in John Sayle’s great Lone Star, and it is quite effective.

The Private Lives of Pippa Lee is yet another fine independent film that slipped away after a limited release. With so much talent involved and so much quality on the screen, you will want to check it out. The DVD has limited special features, the primary interest being commentary by Wright and Miller. There are brief interviews with the Wright, Arkin and Lively, however these interviews reveal little very little about the film or the actors.

All rise.

The rules of this courtroom are simple. You will be presented with two songs, one by the plaintiff and one by the defendant. It is your task to decide if the defendant’s track is only coincidentally similar to the plaintiffs or, as members of the Bar Association put it, how… could… you?! You have been duly instructed.

Today’s docket: Blues Traveler, plaintiffs vs. Sister Hazel, defendants

Blues Traveler – “Runaround,” from Four (1994)

We recorded three albums that got us nothing but stoner groupies. Finally, we get a hit song and hot stoner groupies! Then these jerks come along, rip off our melody and our hot stoner groupies! What’s this crap?

Sister Hazel – “All For You,” from …Somewhere More Familiar (1997)

It’s so unfair. We never, ever ripped off Blues Traveler. We had no intention of ripping off Blues Traveler. Hootie, maybe!

We ’80s kids don’t have a lot to hang on to, so far as social achievements go. It was a difficult decade to grab a hold of. We had pop culture, and lots of it, but we were also afraid of being vaporized by nuclear war as we slept, the division between the races was as contentious as it had ever been, and there was this new mystery disease that was starting to make the headlines – Still, we always had Live Aid to stand up for our time. It was, in it’s way, an unprecedented act of human goodwill, a triumph of justice over fame, in many ways, and we could be proud it happened while we were the prime demographic. We always had Live Aid, but perhaps not so anymore.

I find it incredibly hard to be completely ignorant. I slip up occasionally, and usually at the most public, inopportune times, but I tend to be unfortunately well-read, sometimes masochistically so. I cannot stand the Sunday political chat shows with everyone shouting everyone else down and John McLaughlin essentially telling all of them they’re wrong, yet I watch them. I get stomach aches about our governing bodies and how nobody in Washington has the ability to work together. I have expressed how I feel the Republicans have adopted Surge-like tactics in their practices – capture and hold. If they maintain a unified front, no matter what piece of legislation is being debated, it is the Democrats’ game to lose. Regrettably, they don’t see how they’re being played, and so they splinter within and, yes, they lose.

My position is not universally agreed upon, not by a long shot. For every person like myself who cries foul for poor sportsmanship, there is another who claims that the Republicans are merely not being cowed, will not vote for legislation they don’t agree with, and if the Democrats can’t see it for what it is and must manufacture conspiracies to placate themselves, so be it. For every one of us on either side of the political fence, however, there are two with their eyes squeezed shut and their ears plugged and, you know what? They always seem happy. They never seem squelched by the existential angst of our times, never bothered by the flailing and flagellation happening all around them as they whistle a happy tune, and it makes me sick.

Of course, they’ll use that as their defense: If you stopped worrying about stuff, what the politicians are doing, what the priests are doing, my indifference to it all, you could be happy like me. It is a very tempting drug, this self-contained universe some people live in. It is a step beyond zen and, from the outside, it truly looks like nothing bad ever gets through their soap bubble of contentment, which  only serves to piss me off more, but I digress. One of the key tricks to disconnecting is literally disconnecting. Turn off the news, direct the web browser only to happy places, Farmville, OMG Catz, and the like. The less I know, the less I’ll kvetch, right?

The media has a vested interest in keeping us, and in this case me, connected. Outrage spikes viewership, viewership captures eyes, eyes take in advertising, advertising helps sell products, etc., etc. Rather than focusing on the nuts and bolts, most newscasts are also very concerned with exposing the things “they” didn’t want you to know, things you have very little control over, but still capture your undivided attention. They feed into the neuroses of the public, and so the concept of shutting down your exposure to it isn’t entirely a reactionary move. At the same time, this is our world/country/state/town we’re talking about and shouldn’t we at least have a clue about what is going on?

The happiest among us might say, “no.” The powers that be have always been, they always will, and our individual choice of falling as a martyr into their spiderweb has less to do with their dishonest inclinations than it does with our compulsions to be busybodies. Mind your own business and your business will be cheerier for it. Think about good things. Think about Live Aid.

Yes, Live Aid, that one day on July 13th, 1985, fast approaching the 25th anniversary this year, where nations came together via satellite, superstars of music and media converged and the goal was not some hollow, self-satisfying wank, but to raise money for the starving people of Ethiopia. Egos were checked, money was raised, the cause was just and for us 1980’s kids, a touchstone for our generation was raised for all to see. The ’60s had Woodstock. The ’70s had the No Nukes Concerts. We had Live Aid, and the scope of it, the goals it hoped to attain and the concept that, by the end, real strides could actually be made gave us a level of pride. This was more than a protest – this was a clear-cut act for change, an immutable good.

Hold on there, pardner, not so fast. If you stayed away from your computer this week, clicked off the cable news and didn’t check your newspapers (Just joshing – nobody checks papers anymore) you could still float by on that rose-colored scenario. If you are a current events perv that needs his or her daily discipline, well buddy, this week you got spanked. Here’s the excerpt that got me all worked up:

LONDON (March 3) — Amid an ongoing global effort to raise funds for earthquake-stricken Haiti, new allegations surfaced today that millions of dollars raised by the 1985 Live Aid concerts for the victims of the Ethiopian famine were actually spent on weapons. The charges offer a timely reminder that collecting money is the easy part of any relief effort; making sure it gets to the right people is often far more complex.

Former Ethiopian rebel leaders have told the BBC that they siphoned off hundreds of millions of aid dollars to buy guns. Some of the diverted funds allegedly came directly from Western governments, and some from money raised in ticket sales at the twin concerts in London and Philadelphia. A 1985 CIA assessment of the country uncovered by the broadcaster also acknowledges that money ending up in militants’ coffers. “Some funds that insurgent organizations are raising for relief operations, as a result of increased world publicity, are almost certainly being diverted for military purposes,” it said.

Disappointing. Twenty-five years on, coup after coup after scandal after takedown, the grown-up in me always knew this kind of thing happened and should not be shocked that it happened in this circumstance too. The kid in me wants to believe there was a big mistake, this isn’t true, E.T. is real and the cereal with that sweet frosting is not actually good for me and, ultimately, won’t make me crap my brains out tomorrow morning. My inner child wants me to flip on ignorance as a defense mechanism and keep this myriad disillusionment from screwing with the historical record as I see it, or at least as I prefer to see it. I at least want to still feel like we got something right during that decade where so much was going wrong, just in case you forgot what it felt like being trickled down upon.

If you are unaware of what that means, essentially the ‘trickle-down theory’ of economics was put into place wherein tax breaks and cuts were directed not at those who simply couldn’t afford them, but to the highest earners of the country, those who could easily afford them. The concept was that the rich who had more discretionary funds at their disposal would spend more, presumably in stores run by the less wealthy, which employed even less well-off, who would then take their pay to businesses in their own financial bracket. It was a tiered system like a tower of champagne glasses, the champagne poured from the top and eventually trickled down to all the glasses as it overflowed from above.  On paper it looks like a feasible plan, but we live in the real world, not on paper. Theoretical economists failed to take fully into account the class war that was going on in the 1980s, foolishly believing these things only happened in Europe. The rich kept the money in their circle, or kept it stashed in off-shore accounts, or decided that instead of creating new wealth by promoting through the ranks, they’d hang onto their positions like grim death or just make sure that Junior knew enough about the family industry to keep from sinking the ship when they inherited it. What of junk bonds? What of Lifestyles Of The Rich And Famous?

We reap the results of those decisions and divisions today. The disparity between the nation’s highest earners and the supposed middle class has never been as starkly wide as it is right now. These are the rotten fruits whose vines were planted when we were kids, boom boxes on shoulders, Vans on our feet, color-change t-shirts on our backs and spiked hair climbing to the heavens (or at least the gymnasium girders) like cathedral spires, but at least we had Live Aid – the one time when we thought we got it right. In my disillusionment, as I attempted to reconcile that bitter piece of news, I put the information I had learned out to the Popdose Staff e-mail. I spoke of how it would be so easy to shut out the realities of charity, good intentions, and the revelation that perhaps ignorance was bliss, and in my zeal to stay connected to the world as it truly is, I’ve only brought harm to myself. Perhaps I finally needed to consider an interest in disinterest.

My colleague and all-around go-to guy on current events, Jon Cummings, responded with a carefully thought out reply:

When I worked at an NGO affiliated with the UN, we were always concerned with what’s often called “global chaos” theory. (As opposed to “chaos theory,” which you can get from Jeff Goldblum in Jurassic Park.) The idea of “global chaos” is that people in first-world nations are always reading about horrible things that are happening in the third world — wars (featuring ancillary wonderfulness like child soldiers and institutionalized rape), famines, massive destruction from earthquakes and typhoons and tsunamis, evil dictators who brutalize their own people, etc., etc.

And all that awful news encourages people to follow their natural instinct, which is to turn away from that information–and thus from the people and problems of the third world. It’s an inclination that often keeps charitable giving down, keeps citizens from pressing their governments to help other people, and (certainly in the case of the US) keeps our government’s foreign aid budget ridiculously low as a percentage of total spending, compared with other first-world nations. (Of course, if you consider the cost of our wars and military presences around the world as “foreign aid,” that percentage increases, but there’s often little actual benefit for the downtrodden in military spending.)

Revelations about spending inefficiencies at certain NGOs or resulting from certain spasms of charitable giving (bureaucracy, extravagant salaries, aid money diverted to dictators or gun-runners, etc.) are a huge problem for the fundraising efforts of aid groups. These groups almost always have the best intentions, but are hardly perfect themselves and often have to deal with far-from-perfect political situations in the countries they’re trying to serve. Supposedly the money from George Harrison’s Bangladesh concert & album got delayed for years and years; it’s no real surprise to hear that some Live Aid money got diverted into feeding the civil war that begat the famine in Ethiopia, rather than feeding the starving people themselves.

The buildup of news about such incidents adds to the flood of information that has undermined our faith in institutions of all kinds–which, of course, turns us inward even more to find solutions for our own lives, and to ignore the lives and troubles of others.

Getting on the soapbox for a moment, I think the Republican Party, in the wake of its own disasters of governance and electoral failure, has devoted itself to promoting its own sort of “domestic chaos theory” to undermine the citizenry’s belief that government can do anything positive to solve society’s problems. The more horror stories (bullshit or not bullshit) the Republicans can throw against the wall about politicians, government inefficiencies, or beneficiaries of government support (the poor, gays, immigrants, etc., etc.), the more people doubt the policies that might actually help various portions of the citizenry. And if government isn’t allowed to do anything, of course, conservatism wins.

Climbing down from the soapbox…the Live Aid story certainly is depressing, and a cautionary tale. But when you’re dealing with international charity, there’s a certain amount of such stuff that you have to deal with if you want to do ANYTHING for the actual people who need help.

You can’t hide under a rock, or stick fingers in ears or flip down the sunglasses if you have any interest in doing what’s right. Nor can you allow yourself to be dissuaded by the disappointing actions of profiteers and mercenaries – wherever the cash carcass is, they’re likely going to get there first to pick at the bones. In this world, that means you have to kill your darlings, all of them, including the illusions you had in your youth about the best of intentions. Not all the money raised at Live Aid got to the needy, but some did, and certainly the concert raised an unprecedented amount of awareness of the situation. Was it the shining success I always thought it was? No, but it may not be the failure that got me feeling so hopeless either. These are the small victories; take them when we can.

Passive ignorance is not a pathway to peace and the validity of one’s disappointment must be measured against one’s engagement in the process, I suppose. Like the old cliche keeps repeating, if you don’t vote, don’t complain – and if you’re not interested in helping, don’t get too depressed when others aren’t helping either. Bad news can still  “bring us down,” we’re still sentient beings capable of empathy (most of the time,) but if we were a society where none of us saw the problems, then none of us would be equipped to help. You only fight the fires you’re seeing, and if you don’t allow yourself to see them, everything burns. Ecclesiates 7:3 reads, “Sorrow is better than laughter, because a sad face is good for the heart.” While the text sounds dire, it essentially boils down to a realization of that which is wrong, which should stir our relationship to the circumstances and cause us to change them. Sorrow, while unpleasant, tells us something. It motivates us if we allow it, but rather than seeing it as an allowance to feel shame, embarrassment or sadness, it can allow us to hear a call to action.

These are hard lessons and I’m not the first to have to wrestle with them. If you’re not inclined to find parallels in Biblical study, try “Araby” from James Joyce’s Dubliners or William Blake’s Songs of Innocence and Experience. Things aren’t the way we thought they were. The only question left is, what do we plan to do about that? For myself, I’m going to try, and if there is anything untarnished to take away from July 13th, 1985, it is that trying to make the world better is, in itself, an immutable good.

We can start here – To contribute to charitable services helping in the Haitian and Chilean relief efforts, please contact the following reputable organizations:

AmeriCares,  Doctors Without Borders, USA,  Habitat for Humanity International,

Hope for Haiti,  American Red Cross

Although I didn’t know it at the time, Hagar was about to make a really big impression in my world. Shock waves moved through the rock world in 1985 with the slightly unexpected departure of David Lee Roth from Van Halen. When the dust began to settle from Roth’s departure, Sammy Hagar was the new guy holding the microphone in Van Halen. I knew enough about Hagar at this point to know what an interesting and unorthodox choice Van Halen had just made. Vocally, Hagar was anything but a clone of David Lee Roth – a clear roll of the dice and statement from Van Halen that they were going to do something different. And so it began, one of the most controversial ( heavily debated to this day, and ultimately one of the most successful) lineup changes in the history of rock and roll music.

One of the things that made the Hagar pick interesting, was that he was not only already very established as a solo artist, but he was also one helluva guitar player. The question: would Hagar be able to let someone else be the guitar player? The answer: When you’re getting Van Halen money? Absolutely.

But how did Hagar become the “Red Rocker?”

For that answer, we’ll take a trip back to 1978 to visit Sammy Hagar at home in San Francisco, caught live on a typically hot night at Winterland. Having just wrapped up a tour opening up for Alvin Lee and Ten Years After, Hagar was back at home to play a gig celebrating the 10th anniversary of San Francisco rock station KSJO-FM (R.I.P., btw – damn you, Clear Channel).

This gig is a great example of the gems lurking within the Wolfgang’s Vault archives – one of two late ’70s complete gigs from Hagar available for streaming at the Vault. The show was a return to the scene of the crime for Hagar, who had recently recorded parts of an upcoming live album, titled All Night Long, at Winterland. The live album featured one new track, “I’ve Done Everything For You,” which would be recast five years later as a hit for rising Aussie heartthrob Rick Springfield.

It’s always a good ducat to have in your back pocket – to be able to drop details of a live album that was recorded in the same venue where the already rabidly revved up audience is. And there’s nothing quite like the additional thrill of knowing that there is new material on that album, new material (the previously mentioned “I’ve Done Everything For You”) that you’re going to hear tonight! One-two, and there’s a knockout scored by the Red Rocker.

Midway through the set, Hagar and lead guitarist Gary Pihl square off for a six string duel that carries us through nearly 17 minutes worth of the Montrose staple “Bad Motor Scooter.” Noting that he had been “smoked” by Pihl the previous night in Sacramento, Hagar lays down the gauntlet for a rematch – a fretboard fight to the death. And the winner is?

In addition to Hagar’s already more than impressive band (featuring Pihl, future Night Ranger keyboard player Alan Fitzgerald, bass player Bill “Electric” Church, and drummer Chuck Ruff), the hometown crowd gets the benefit of a few special guests that truly take this gig to the next level. Journey guitarist Neal Schon (a future collaborator with Hagar on the HSAS project) comes out to jam with Hagar for the first time ever on a raggedly unrehearsed (make that a “very unrehearsed”) version of the Montrose favorite “Rock Candy.”

Schon sticks around for the remainder of the set, joined by Eddie Money and Money’s guitarist Jimmy Lyon to help Hagar round out the gig with a cover (according to Hagar, “something that none of us know”) of “Gimme Some Lovin’” and some bluesy jamming to wrap up the night. Hagar doesn’t exactly stick with his frequent promises throughout the set to play all night, but after 90 minutes plus, and the special guests that showed up, I doubt that anyone was complaining.

Sammy says it best at the conclusion of “Turn Up The Music,” “Goddamn rock and roll forever!”

Listen to this entire show at Concert Vault by clicking here.

One day last September, the mail included a hand-addressed envelope with a New York City postmark and a return address that turned out to be a Mail Boxes Etc. store near Times Square. Inside was a sheet of paper with an odd story on it and instructions to go to TippersMusic.com and request a CD from a band called The Twenty % Tippers.

How exciting! Finally, mysteries were coming my way! And as someone who read a lot of Nancy Drew and Trixie Belden back in the day, I am always looking for mysteries.

And so, I requested my free CD. It arrived, I listened to it, and then I emailed and requested an interview with the band.

Eventually, I talked to Ken Sorkin, the band’s founder, impresario, and short-story writer. The Tippers were not some odd hoax put together by McSweeney’s interns, but rather a band that had played in bars in New York in the early 1990s. “I put the band together because I wanted to get these songs realized,” he says. “But I knew that no one would want to see a band that they’d never heard of, so we wanted to create a mailing list as soon as possible.” In those pre-Internet days, that meant putting up fliers around Manhattan and setting up a telephone hot line (646-335-3390). Those who signed up received notices about upcoming dates and one of Sorkin’s short stories telling of the fictional alternative life of the band and its members.

“The music didn’t get any attention,” he says. “The stories did.”

The band members drifted apart. Sorkin got married, moved to California, then returned to New York. And yet, The Twenty%Tippers keep finding new followers. Sorkin wanted to share his stories with more people, so he began using different public online databases to find potentially interested folk. He searches for occupation more than for ideology or geography, trying to find people who are more likely to be intrigued than frightened when the letter carrier brings a hand-addressed envelope from someone they’ve never heard of in New York. His targets include college professors, ad agency employees, and computer programmers.

“We’re reaching people we’re not supposed to be in touch with,” he says, because the band has no connection to them. But those curious folks who respond often correspond, which Sorkin says has been wonderful. “There are people you make connections with,” he says. “It’s just crazy. We’re an unknown band, but there are people all over the country who are in touch with us.”

Sorkin still writes fiction based on a band called the Twenty%Tippers. He doesn’t have a novel, although a few editors and agents have contacted him after finding out about the band. The band itself is defunct. That’s partly because Sorkin has a day job and a family that make it hard to play, and because the songs span enough genres that it has been difficult to find musicians willing to tackle the body of work for no pay.

Here’s one Tippers song, “Breadman.”

If you like it, go to TippersMusic.com and request the CD. Although Sorkin gave me permission to post one song, he prefers a CD to a download precisely because it is less accessible. He wants more commitment from his listeners before they develop an opinion than is possible with a two or three-second clip.

The project started as a mutual admiration, shared between Burton and Mercer, and discovered when the two performed with their respective bands at the 2004 Roskilde festival. Flash forward four years to 2008 when the duo locked themselves down in Burton’s studio and challenged themselves to expand beyond the box they respectively fit in. For Burton, this meant abandoning the trappings of being Danger Mouse, and focusing on live instrumentation. For Mercer, the challenge was to stretch his vocal repertoire to its limits. The result is, arguably, one of the better records to come out in the first quarter of 2010.

There is an earthy, almost lo-fi, quality to the album that flies in the face of the songs reclusive nature. To say this is a record best listened to on a quality set of headphones is an understatement. While not a quirky as Radiohead or Animal Collective, the production more accurately evokes shades of Dark Side of the Moon era Pink Floyd. Layers upon layers of vocals, crunchy drum tracks, swirling guitars, unidentifiable electronic blips and beeps and the occasional surprise — take the trumpet solo in “Mongrel Heart” for instance — keep the otherwise laid-back record interesting. Think of this record as indie easy listening — modern mellow gold, if you will — with tuneful, mid-tempo songs that you can mindlessly hum along to after just one or two listens.

Those melodies are the real strength of Broken Bells. Whether driven by Burton’s synth heavy lines or Mercer’s quirky vocals, the real star of the album are the ten tracks that make up the record. The murmured chant that kicks off “Your Head Is on Fire” is an earworm of epic proportions. The first single, “The High Road,” strikes a precarious balance between its folksy verses, and its trip-hop chorus before resolving in an effective mash-up of the two.

There are the rare moments where the influence of the member’s previous work informs the songwriting. “The Mall and Misery” features a guitar riff that cribs heavily from The Shins sound, and “The High Road” definitely borrows from Burton’s work with the Gorillaz. Fans of either member’s previous discography will find little common ground here to grasp onto, but should still give Broken Bells a chance.

If you listen to any radio station these days, it’s easy to hear how much the lines between R&B (and pop to a certain extent) and hip-hop have blurred. While it’s no big deal to hear the two genres combined in popular music nowadays, it was a different story 20 years ago for sure. The “new jack swing” movement of the late Eighties (as exemplified by music from the likes of Keith Sweat, Bobby Brown and Al B. Sure!) opened the door slightly when it came to public acceptance of soul music with a youthful, somewhat street aesthetic, but the door that separated the two genres didn’t get kicked down until the spring of 1990, when the music-buying public was introduced to…the three scrubs from New Edition?

Yep, folks. Although a lot of folks may think of Bell Biv DeVoe’s Poison and chuckle, that album (and its smash title track) has turned out to be more influential than most people will give it credit for. From the risqué lyrical content to the uncompromisingly hip-hop production, these dudes were as street as pop music got back in the day. Not bad for a project that essentially started as an accident.

The year was 1989. Ricky Bell, Michael Bivins and Ronnie DeVoe were best known as the Tito, Jackie and Marlon of teen idols New Edition (lead singers Ralph Tresvant and Johnny Gill were Michael and Jermaine, respectively). The tour in support of N.E.’s multi-platinum 1988 album Heart Break had just ended, and Gill and Tresvant had made the decision to concentrate on solo records. As legend has it, the other three group members were trying to figure out what to do with their idle time when legendary production team Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis suggested that they record an album. Dumbfounded that they hadn’t thought of that themselves, Bell Biv DeVoe was born, and wound up selling more records than Tresvant and Gill’s subsequent solo efforts — combined.

Pop music was still in its lollipops-and-roses phase back in 1990. The most “urban” your local Top 40 station got was probably Bobby Brown, and despite his future legal and assorted other image woes, rapping about Ghostbusters wasn’t exactly threatening. So songs like “Poison” and its’ even more ribald follow up “Do Me!” were legitimately shocking at that time. Not only was the production (courtesy of a raft of newcomers and Public Enemy’s Bomb Squad, then at the top of their game) more funky and coarse than the shiny Babyface-helmed Brown records, but these guys managed to score smashes with the most sexually explicit-some might say misogynist- music of its’ time. “Never trust a big butt and a smile”? “The low-pro ho was cut like an Afro”? Talking about underage sex and condoms? “Smack it up, flip it, rub it down”?!?!? While Britney Spears singing “If You Seek Amy” may get shrugged off these days, BBD raised more than their share of eyebrows back in the day with Poison’s lyrical content.

It also opened BBD up to a fan base who otherwise would have turned their noses up at anything associated with New Edition’s “soft” image. The group’s forthright lyrics and fashion sense (wearing customized hip-hop gear at a time when most R&B singers were still wearing glittery suits) made them the acceptable face of R&B for the first generation to be raised in hip-hop culture. They also tacked two New Edition-styled ballads onto the end of the album, as if to make sure their faithful legion of suburban female fans (the ones who hadn’t already defected to New Kids on the Block) wouldn’t be completely freaked out.

At any rate, the evolution of hip-hop soul had a lot to do with BBD’s success, in more ways than one. It’s hard to imagine acts like Mary J. Blige and Jodeci existing without Bell Biv DeVoe’s success. Hell, TLC was created as a female answer to BBD. By himself, Michael Bivins also pretty much created the artist/mogul template that most current R&B/hip-hop big willies aspire to these days, discovering and grooming acts like Another Bad Creation and Boyz II Men. It’s hard to imagine there being a Jermaine Dupri or a Puff Daddy without there being a Michael Bivins. The influence that Bell Biv DeVoe had on the contemporary scene in their brief time as hitmakers (Poison’s follow-up album flopped HARD) lingers despite the fact that parts of the album haven’t exactly aged well.

However, that shouldn’t take anything away from the fact that Poison, for better or for worse, is easily one of the five most important R&B albums made in the past 20 years. It took two genres that were fairly autonomous and blurred the lines to the point where you couldn’t really tell what was what anymore. They also taught us two very important lessons: don’t underestimate the scrubs, and never trust a big butt and a smile.

During my first year at BGSU, I saw two motion pictures within a span of nine months that shook me to my core. When I entered college I thought I was in touch with my faith, even considering the possibility of becoming a minister. Movies won out, though.

As school began in the fall of ‘88, I was home one weekend and drove to downtown Cleveland and crossed a picket line to see The Last Temptation of Christ, Martin Scorsese’s groundbreaking adaptation of Nikos Kazantzakis’ controversial novel. The film was just as controversial as it was denounced by religious groups for, among other things, its portrayal of a final temptation by Satan to Jesus while he’s near death on the cross. Satan proposes that Christ come down from the cross and when he does, he will experience life as a man: a wife, children, and sensual pleasures. This last bit was the most controversial part as Jesus was seen making love to his wife, Mary Magdalene. Jesus refuses the devil’s temptation and ascends into heaven.

This vision of the final temptation was not what affected me so deeply. Instead, it was the sight of Jesus, so beautifully portrayed by Willem Dafoe, struggling with his conscience, weak, and questioning his own faith and sanity. For the first time in my life, I saw Jesus not as a walking, talking deity who performed miracles and offered proverbs, but as a man, with all of the flaws that come with being a human being. Thanks to Scorsese’s picture, I questioned the lessons I was taught (and believed) as a child, some 16 years of Sunday school. Jesus as the son of man, as well as the son of God, had never been clearly explained. I don’t want to say that I felt betrayed, but I was deeply troubled.

When the school year ended, I returned home to my parents’ house, to the same job I’d worked the previous summer, and to the same routines I’d had before my first taste of independence at college. One of those routines was attending church, which felt like I was going through the motions instead of receiving inspiration. That June I watched Peter Weir’s film version of the Paul Theroux novel, The Mosquito Coast. In this powerful, meditative movie, River Phoenix stars as a young man uprooted with the rest of his family by his eccentric, inventor father, Allie. The father is convinced that society is about to collapse, that nuclear annihilation is inevitable. He and his family build a new life among the natives in Central America, with Allie slowly losing his mind.

Harrison Ford portrays Allie, in what may be his finest performance as an actor. His acting is magnetic. The jolt he gave Allie’s rants against society and organized religion, in particular, were startling and stuck to me like the remnants of an old caramel lodged in my teeth. For the remainder of my four years in college I grappled with my faith, my mind restless with questions about the church and God. My mind seemed to settle when I met Julie in 1992.

It felt like destiny. Indeed, whenever I reflect on the series of events and relationships I went through to wind up working at the same produce store as she was, I continue to believe that something greater than mere coincidence that brought us together. And for a while, I was able to sustain my spirituality.  Although I did not attend church regularly, I found comfort in the quiet of the night when I could pray; and I found inspiration in the lyrics and music of such artists like Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, Patty Griffin, and U2. Moreover, as I pursued a career in film, I continued to turn to the movies to give me insight. It was through the movies that I first heard Eddie Vedder’s gorgeous “The Long Road,” his contribution to the film and soundtrack of Dead Man Walking, the haunting film adapted and directed by Tim Robbins, based on the book by Sister Helen Prejean.

If you’ve never heard “The Long Road,” pause now to listen to it. Notice the intricacies of the guitar playing by Vedder and Ry Cooder, how it lays the foundation for the rest of the sparse instrumentation — a dumbek, a harmonium, and a tabla. Hovering over the proceedings are the otherworldly vocals of the late Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, backed by Farrukh Fateh Ali Khan and Rahat Ali Khan. If you’re only familiar with Vedder as the passionate lead singer of Pearl Jam, you may be surprised at his angelic, soulful singing and the beauty of this hymn he’s written. Its mixture of Americana and Middle Eastern music is transcendent.

In the past eight years I’ve been questioning my faith again. I should be thankful that Jacob is healthy, that the medicines he sucks into his lungs each day and the regiment of pills he takes each night are helping him. There are other cf families, families in situations worse than ours, families who should be as angry and sad as I am; these families all have stronger faiths. Why can’t I let go of these emotions that cloud my heart and block the embrace of a higher being? Like the lyrics in the song, I think to myself, “I have wished for so long/How I wished for you today.” Could it be that the questions that shook me to the core 20 years ago were never fully answered? Will I always be waiting for a response to my “why?” I’ll keep searching, hoping that someday the truths I seek will come to me and this burden will lift.

Until that time, I’ll continue down the long road, with my family by my side, and music to guide me.

Let it first be proclaimed that talking the smack about Run-DMC pains me on a very deep and contemplative level; it feels much like punching my grandfather, or making fun of my son’s hair when he stumbles up in the morning (to be fair, though, he looks totally drunk, and it’s kind of hilarious).

But Raising Hell was the first real cassette I ever high-speed dubbed (though I made sure to awkwardly snip out the super-bad words), and my entry into not only hip-hop but the greater world in general, as at the time I was living in a one-stoplight whistle-stop called Upland, Ind., where it was generally accepted that the music world basically began and ended with Amy Grant. My devotion lasted through for years, too, through Tougher Than Leather, through Down with the King, and through the first seven seconds of Crown Royal, which immediately thereafter turned into a pretty shocking platter of comprehensive suck.

Crown Royal has more problems than South Carolina’s political structure, but the main one is that it is a Run-DMC record like I am Lou Rawls. Because of his highly unfortunate yet crippling vocal issues, and because of the record’s guest-stuffed blueprint, Jam Master Jay’s production is all but absent and DMC doesn’t appear on the record much more than I do. (Indeed, DMC’s vocal problems had exploded by this point, and it was no secret that he’d grown more and more disenchanted leading up to the record’s oft-delayed release.)

So, Run compensated. Sure, in 2001 everyone in the world was using the guest-list thing to launch their comebacks in the wake of the Santana Supernatural behemoth, but this thing sports a cast that looked bad in 2001 and damn near suicidal in 2010: Fred Durst, Everlast, Jagged Edge, Sugar Ray, the guy from Third Eye Jesus Wept Blind. But at least the Supernatural guest stars played to the style of their gracious host, where Crown Royal found Rev. Run scrambling to catch up by trying to cover all genres of The Billboard 200.

Weirdly, the fatal absence of DMC doesn’t stop Run from frequently name-checking his MIA colleague, but without his foil Run sounds like he’s paddling in a sea of newcomers, with not much to do but repeatedly — so very repeatedly — proclaim his own importance. Sure, that can’t really be overstated, but after three tracks or so one really starts thirsting for a track about girls or something. Disastrously, it’s provided by Run and Fred Durst, whose “Them Girls” is about how they like all the girls, which sounds predictably lame from Durst, but creepily off-base coming from a newly christened reverend (especially one who’s espousing the virtues of his wife and home life like two songs later).

Most of the poorly chosen guest stars fare about that well. With the exception of maybe Method Man and Nas, the guest stars illustrated just how far rap hadn’t come. Kid Rock did his pre-jerking off-Skynyrd thing on “The School of Old,” which is amazing when you consider the number of people who must have thought that was a good title. Stephen Jenkins of Third Eye Blind sounds like he went into the wrong studio. Sugar Ray plays Sugar Ray music as Run conspicuously handles DMC’s verse on “Here We Go 2001.” (Things aren’t all lost. The Jermaine Dupri-produced opening track “It’s Over,” all rubber groove and Carmina Burana samples, gets the head bobbing, but it sounds so similar to the Side B track “Let’s Stay Together” that I thought I downloaded the same song twice.)

To have this forced awkwardness be the last recording with Jam Master Jay, who was killed a year and a half later, is a crushing blow; and of the group’s subsequent solo releases, Run’s Distortion was under 25 minutes long and DMC’s Checks, Thugs and Rock N’ Roll was noteworthy mostly for a single in which the chorus of “Cats in the Cradle” was sung by fellow adoptee Sarah McLachlan, which will, hopefully one day, make for the weirdest Lilith Fair moment ever. Crown Royal, party people, will leave your dreams most unfulfilled.