Celebrities are a good example for the little people, proving that you don't have to be actually attractive to get laid. Age doesn't matter a bit. Everyone wears scarves or flips their collar up and you have enough money to go on vacation into infinity. It's exactly like real life, but with more vacation. It is our firm belief that celebrity couples are the way a decadent society expresses itself, and in the A-Rod-Madonna era, these five other pairings boggle the mind and tug at the heart:

There's a lot of weird pairings going on right now, putting the world in a similar position to when Archduke Ferdinand was assassinated in 1914. (Legend has it John Mayer's to blame for that one.) Celebrity couples were the way Nostradamus made predictions, and they are the basis of whatever the heck Simon Baker does every week on The Mentalist. We've already explained the reason for the A-Rod-Madonna connection, and you can add these five signs to the mix:

Jessica Biel and Justin Timberlake
Status: Apparently these two are pre-engaged, a marital state that my Dad says doesn't exist. I have the sinking feeling that the Summer Catch starlet and JT have united under the solid premise that they will both look like old lesbians in under six years. Must two people jog that often'
Who's Getting the Better of It': There is deep possibility that Biel looks like Chyna underneath her clothes. JT calls Jessica 'bro' by accident sometimes, later apologizing with flowers and treadmills. JT can do no wrong.
How Would You Characterize The Sex': Timberlake prefers a muscular woman, like Chyna, or Britney. For Biel's part, it's good to know you can have Justin Timberlake's bat and balls in your mouth anytime you want it. I believe Clive Davis paid generously to set up a similar situation with JT.
Prognosis: A couple that exercises together, stays together...until something slightly better comes along.

David Cross and Amber Tamblyn
Status: There's nothing like a good age gap to get those sexual juices flowing. The former Joan of Arcadia, Tamblyn's 25 and Cross is 44, which is really not that bad if you rate it on the Billy Joel meter.
Who's Getting The Better of It': It depends on whether David is in Mr. Show form or if he sounds anything like he did on his last CD. Since he was probably drinking during the former and sober for the latter, at least we know Tamblyn is safe from his beer rage.
How Would You Characterize The Sex': What's the over-under on the number of Never Nude jokes that are made in that bedroom' They probably just cuddle up in front of Arrested Development reruns and snuggle like most Jewish couples.
Prognosis: A Mitch Albom book in the making.

Milo Ventimiglia and Hayden Panettiere
Status: Milo broke Rory Gilmore's heart onGilmore Girls and he's been dating the freshly legal Hayden after a few other ladies didn't make the cut. I'd judge him more harshly, but three years in close quarters with Alexis Bledel is tough to top. I'm interested in signing a multi-year contract to be her underpants.
Who's Getting the Better of It': Milo is a lacto-vegetarian, and that's pretty much the only advantage he has on the 19 year-old actress.
How Would You Characterize The Sex': Hayden always promises they'll expand their repertoire, but instead they're so tired from shopping all day Milo just plays Grand Theft Auto with Hayden's younger brother, hoping to get cast as Maebe's love interest in the new Arrested Development movie.
Prognosis: Hayden's going to release her own CD later this year, an enterprise which will likely allow her to turf her hanger-on boyfriend and the rest of the cast of Heroes. Never again will she have to reassure Milo that he looks hot on an escalator. In five months, she won't remember Robert Forster's name.

Joe Jonas and Camille Belle
Status: This developing young celebrity couple is the newest smash pairing, and comes on the heels of Jonas' phone break-up with squeeze Taylor Swift (right).
Who's Getting the Better Of It': The story behind this one is weird, as Jonas essentially swapped country star Swift for a woman who looks exactly like her, but a brunette. And he did it in a 27 second phone call. The Jonas always wins.
How Would You Characterize The Sex': Non-existent. The brothers have openly stated that their abstinence is "pretty awesome, and the rings are just one of our ways of kind of like being different than everybody else out there." They started wearing the rings because their parents Denise and Kevin Sr. asked them if they wanted to.
Prognosis: Is there a red-headed up-and-coming actress or singer that Jonas can switch over to now' It can't be Joss Stone, because she would throw his purity ring in the English Channel.

Tina Fey and Bob Tuna
Status: Happily married until Tina starts commanding $15 million a movie, Tina's husband is a composer for SNL, and was born without a name. We call him Bob Tuna because we think it's a mean thing to call someone, like, "Hey Bob Tuna!" or "Bob Tuna! Uncalled for!" You know, if he does something inappropriate.
Who's Getting The Better of It': Just ask Todd Palin. In the photo of the Tuna at left, you can see him just mere seconds before he experienced his first unhappiness from Fey's success.
How Would You Characterize The Sex': Let's just say the appealing scar on the left side of Tina's face plays a prominent role.
Prognosis: Tina must take Bob Tuna to Mordor.

When the president-elect announced that he'd be making a weekly YouTube addresses, we prepared ourselves for the dulcet tones of Barack's voice soothing us through America's economic crisis. In today's address, Obama channels all the gravitas he can muster as he lectures us on "the survival of the American dream." Talk of "our darkest hour" echoes Winston Churchill, conveniently the only politician who Obama hasn't yet been compared to. In any case, he promises an apocalyptic "new beginning" on January 20th. Click for the clip and promise not to get scared.

For a YouTube address, it reaches relatively deeply into what's going on, even channeling Langston Hughes' most famous poem at one point. I don't think Bush had a State of a Union this eloquent. Incredibly, Obama is actually the distant, distant relative of Winston Churchill. If he's going to break out the intense rhetoric of the wartime British prime minister, he'd better have Winston's sense of humor as well. Churchill famously said upon first meeting Violet Bonham Carter in 1906: "We are all worms. But I really think I am a glow worm."

Today is the 45th anniversary of John F. Kennedy's assassination, the subject of a new novel and unending, inconclusive debate. We may never know the real answer about what happened that day in Dallas, although the coming years will see more and more declassified documents released to the public, finishing with Jackie O's oral history about JFK that enters the public domain in 2044 if all her children have passed on. The photos and footage of that day tells a grave story that eclipses mere words. Click for images that will still move you 45 years after the fact:

Kennedy was headed to meet the press at the end of the motorcade, so most of the reporters weren't traveling — they were patiently waiting for the president to arrive.

Victor Hugo King's photograph of the motorcade taking off.

Justice Department spokesman Edwin Guthman was with RFK on the fateful day. He described RFK's state of mind, quoting him as saying, "There's so much bitterness, I thought they would get one of us, but Jack, after all he'd been through, never worried about it."

Mary Moorman's photograph was taken right after the first shot. Kennedy's left fist is raised towards his throat, and Texas Governor John Connelly has also been shot.

AP photographer Ike Altgens took a picture of President Kennedy's limousine as it proceded down Elm Street in Dealey Plaza. You can see Kennedy reaching for his throat if you look closely enough.

We can't forget the Zapruder film, later modified for widescreen viewing:

Here's a look at where the Warren Commission determined the bullets fired by assassin Lee Harvey Oswald came from. The debate over whether or not there was another shooter involved still isn't completely settled.

This is the view from the depository, where Oswald fired from. "I told the FBI what I had heard [two shots from behind the grassy knoll fence]," said Ken O'Donnell, "but they said it couldn't have happened that way and that I must have been imagining things. So I testified the way they wanted me to. I just didn't want to stir up any more pain and trouble for the family."

This is a drawing from the autopsy photo. Here's a more graphic photo of the autopsy. Later, the autopsy process was determined to be riddled with errors. Of course, hindsight is 20/20, and no one could have known how much controversy the event would spawn.

"Mankind must put an end to war or war will put an end to mankind," Kennedy had told the UN two years earlier.

After he was sworn in, President Johnson addressed the nation: "No words are sad enough to express our sense of loss. No words are strong enough to express our determination to continue the forward thrust of America that he began."

He later accepted the lengthy findings of the Warren Commission.

"I wonder how it is with you, Harold' If I don't have a woman for three days, I get terrible headaches." - JFK to Harold Macmillan in Bermuda, 1961.

Dwindling Club of Witnesses [Dallas Morning News]

It's official — the exhaustive presidential show of pretending to consider a public school for the Obama daughters is over. They'll be attending Chelsea Clinton's alma mater, the Sidwell Friends School. Tuition will cost the the family $28,442 for Sidwell's Lower School in Maryland, and $29,442 per annum once the girls graduate to the Washington D.C. campus. It's a heady and not terribly unusual place for Malia and Sasha Obama's respective political careers to begin, and we'll show you a tour of the grounds these two rapscallions will soon traverse:

Founded by Quakers — America's most useful religious minority — in 1883, the school renovated its 50 year main building in 2006, and turned it green:

The kids will be able to join the lower school's newspaper, The Lower School Times, which features hard-hitting journalism from young men and women not old enough to understand why their interview question is inappropriate:

The Obamas may be interested to know that the school pretty much has a Diversity Department, although the dream of the kids being treated like their classmates died long ago, anyway. Eventually, the age difference between Malia and Sasha will separate the two girls, as Sidwell Friends maintains a separate 5 acre campus for its Lower School in Maryland, while the Upper and Middle Schools sit on the main campus on D.C.'s Wisconsin Avenue. We can only pray Drudge saves a Red Alert for the day that happens. But don't worry: headmaster Bruce B. Stewart will guide the two as only he can until that traumatic day:

Just please, ladies, promise us one thing. Watch out for these two jokers:

Why Sasha and Malia Will Go To Sidwell Friends [Time]

Before the Criterion Collection came along, the idea of releasing a film in widescreen format or with a commentary track was silly. Consumers didn't want that extra crap! Now every film eventually gets an overdone production full of extras, and Criterion is having a harder time carving out a niche in the marketplace for their pricey, tricked-out releases. We say that because the company is offering a 40 percent off sale (!) for three more days. Details, and whether the company can survive the economic downturn, after the jump.

It happens in every field. Innovation changes up a staid industry, and leads to wholesale changes. The company that spearheads the innovation benefits initially, but the real positive effect is on the consumer and a more efficient marketplace. And as a result, the original company can't differentiate itself in the same way it did when it arrived on the scene.

There are aspects of the Criterion Collection that totally puzzle me, like why they take money from Jerry Bruckheimer and why Quentin Tarantino's brilliance offends their better senses, but who are we kidding' If I didn't have a rare Criterion Collection edition of Paolo Pasolini's Salo, I wouldn't be able to shock visitors to my apartment with insane sex and torture under the guise of art.

We wouldn't have a lot if it weren't for Criterion. They were the first folks to really dedicate themselves, even in the days of LaserDisc, to making a product that film geeks could savor. Criterion also helped worthy foreign films get a new life on DVD, bringing Godard, Truffaut, and Antonioni to folks that had never seen their cinematic style before. You can see their dedication to quality in Curtis Tsui's excellent essay about the recent restoration of Wong Kar-Wai's Chungking Express. Unfortunately, you can also see how lack of access to filmmakers hampers the company, and helps studios with clout. Nevertheless, Criterion will try to jump into the Blu-Ray market with new edition of Express, The Third Man, The Man Who Fell to Earth, and Bottle Rocket, which hit stores on December 16th.

In the interim, it's 40 percent off all releases, and there was never a better time to snatch up the 50 year retrospective on Criterion parent Janus Films.

Shop the Classics [The Criterion Collection]

Every Thursday and Saturday, I have the same nightmare. When I wake up in the morning to read the Times on those days, the dream is made real...all over the op-ed page. Her name is Gail Collins. Once the paper's editorial page director, she now writes twice a week, and when those days come around, I'd rather listen to Thomas Friedman say "flat" 800 times than read a single word she writes. Today she has topped herself with the most banal column in the history of the op-ed genre. Don't believe me' The close is "Time for a change." Experience the worst:

Collins' reign over the Times op-ed page until the end of 2006 wasn't altogether a hapless one - she brought along a number of popular columnists. (She did move Frank Rich to the op-ed page, where the best columnist on the paper got a larger platform.) We can't personally testify to any of her editing abilities, but she must have been one hell of a re-writer to have stayed with the paper this long as a weekly writer. She makes Maureen Dowd's column ideas look unique and original. The only advantage she has on Maureen is that she's not a racist (probably).

The theme of today's opus is on her impatience for Barack Obama to replace George W. Bush. Thanks, Gail — you've taken what we're all thinking, albeit weeks ago, and somehow turned that into a column. A long column. A column that actually contains the words, "Can I see a show of hands' How many people want George W. out and Barack in'"

More boring than outright bad, here's the kind of high level thinking that Gail makes you do:

The person who would like this plan least probably would be Barack Obama. Who would want to be saddled with the auto industry's problems ahead of schedule'

Insight! And it's not like she hasn't done this before. Her column last Saturday was titled "Hillary for Secretary'" and it ended with the line, "She might do a terrific job." Every single day she writes a column, all she does it take the first story on Drudge and make alleged jokes about it by appending a question mark to the news in question. Look, Gail, if you're going to bore us with this type of inanity, there's only one place to put it: a blog.

Time For Him To Go [NYT]

As we learned from the lawsuit filed to open Christian dating site eHarmony to homosexuals, everyone wants to take advantage of Neil Clark Warren's methodology that pairs compatible couples. Per the terms of this week's settlement between the dating site and the state of New Jersey, eHarmony will create Compatible Partners, a separate but equal branch of the popular dating site. Congrats to the gays, but those on the straighter side don't really care who uses eHarmony: they just want the unfair barrier to insanely popular gay dating side Manhunt eradicated. New Jersey, tear down that wall!

EHarmony was launched in 2000 by evangelical Christian PhD Neil Clark Warren, and purports to base itself on research of heterosexual couples. Following in the footsteps of the once staunchly hetero Jewish site JDate, the new sit Compatible Partners will use the same hokum to cater to a different clientele. The New Jersey Law Against Discrimination has had strange bedfellows before, and now some are suggesting it's only a matter of time before other niche websites will be forced to admit everyone. The fight against discrimination rolls on! Here comes the story of the Hurricane: it's long past time that popular gay cruising site ManHunt includes str8s.

We felt the bear pain of computer programmer/petitioner Eric McKinley, 46, who described the frustration that straight users of Manhunt must feel every single day of their lives:

"It's a great victory...I tried to use their Web site, and you simply cannot. You only have two options: a man seeking a woman or a woman seeking a man. I'm a man seeking a man, and obviously I can't force it to change its interface."

Most big dating sites now allow same-sex matches, and yet the site most likely to get you laid refuses heteros. Selfish bastards! If evangelical Christians can help gay couples find happiness, I'm sure the legal community can find someone to sue so that Manhunt's gay community is forced to help straights in their quest for love. For example: what is this asshole orifice we've heard so much about' A helpful FAQ is long overdue, as is an explanation of this top/bottom dichotomy. The Manhunt site tour promises "tasty tops" and "hungry bottoms." I've practiced on Oreos, but I still don't completely understand.

And what exactly is a Man Cam — they should be forced to be more specific. Is it just a webcam for guys' Could we use it in schools'

Now is exactly to the time to attack: while the gay lobby stupidly has its eye off the ball. As the legal director for the National Center for Lesbian Rights put it, "We are focused on discrimination against parents, discrimination in employment, the real core issues that have a severely negative impact on our community." Fools!

And we have the perfect lawyer for the cause: former Bush solicitor general Theodore Olson sure did seem glum after the courts ruled against him and his client eHarmony. He'll obviously be happy to help bring Manhunt over to the hetero fold. And it's not like Manhunt hasn't dipped its toes into straighter waters before. Site chairman Jonathan Crutchley had to resign late last summer when it was revealed he'd made a sizeable donation to the McCain campaign. This discrimination will not stand. Heteros can sit in silence no longer — Manhunt belongs to us, too.

[Al Pacino desperately searching his phone for his stylist's number, image from X17, click for the big version]

Teen vampire romance Twilight is finally yours to enjoy in theaters, and one day later, it's already the best debut for a female director ever. The first numbers indicate the film has made $32.7 million so far, and online ticket purchases haven't been this hot since The Dark Knight. The film will have doubled its miniscule budget by the time the weekend is over, but if you're not a fan of the books, is it worth getting good with Twilight' We review the most important film of this or any other generation:

Twilight's long-ancipated opening finally has brought the wildly popular series to devoted fans and vampire noobs alike, whether they like it or not. South Park parodied Twilight groupies by turning class geek Butters into a member of The Ungroundable, per se, but the real laughs emerge during the film's 2 hour running time.

Directed by Thirteen helmer Catherine Hardwicke, the cinematic version of Twilight is an audience participation movie, drawing constant laughs from viewers. It's not entirely clear that the film doesn't mean to be funny. The filmmakers seemed to know that teens and adults would be hooting at the events of the film no matter what they did. Instead of making the novels into something they're not, Hardwicke and screenwriter Melissa Rosenberg hammed it up, and the result is something like a love story happening during Night of the Living Dead, a contrast that lends itself to comedy. You can debate exactly how hammy Twilight is, but even the most devoted fan has to crack a smile when Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson) scrunches up his face as only he can.

The film begins with a bracing voiceover directly from the book,a technique that it barely bothers to return to. Presented with a uniquely smart and outsider-y heroine in the book version of Bella, the film's Isabella Swan (Kristen Stewart) doesn't struggler to fit in like her literary alter-ego. We never really feel for her. She arrives at a new school, and two scenes later she's already chatting up various hotties. Though at one point she tells her father that she likes being alone, it's a curious statement, considering she's virtually never alone in the movie.

Readers of the book will find Hardwicke and Rosenberg's translation familiar, and for the most part, faithful. Yes, the action sequence where mean vampire James tracks Bella as Edward tries to save her turns about 200 pages into five minutes' worth of screen time, and it's more hokey than satisfying. But it's a big book - something has to give. You can't make a film with this flimsy a plot into a 3 hour epic.

What's left over should be judged on its own merits, and and embracing the campier qualities was the right move, even if it was the only option available. Adults may have laughed their balls off during the tired courtship of Anakin Skywalker and Queen Amidala, but that only proves how difficult it is to write a convincing teen romance. Every move Robert Pattinson makes here draws a laugh, as do the film's numerous near-kisses. The more serious you made his Edward Cullen out to be, the worse a parody the film would become. Pattinson's a terrible actor, but this isn't an easy part to play.

Really, there is no such thing as a serious vampire, and though the filmmakers tried their best to elevate the stakes of Bella's romance with Edward, between tree-climbing, staring intently and playing DeBussy on the piano, the film's going to get laughs no matter how you stage it. Don't think teens aren't in on the joke. Edward Cullen is a manpire that Bella Swan and every girl dreams about — and that includes having a sense of humor about his pale predicament. He lives up to that expectation by delivering a vampire that is breezy, fun, and most of all, hot. Stewart herself isn't much of an actress (as she proved in her abominable Letterman appearance) but the supporting cast is appealing, especially Bella's Quileute friend Jacob and the bratty vampire clan that surrounds Bella and Edward's love.

It's not great news that Melissa Rosenberg, and probably Hardwicke as well, will be back for the first sequel, New Moon. The two proved they were far better at making Forks, Washington fun than directing any kind of action. And New Moon is full of the latter, featuring an extended sequence in Europe and likely demanding a special effects budget much larger than that of the original for its new creatures. It's too bad for fans of the book that they have to make three big budget features out of this concept, when so much about Twilight would be more suited to a series. I guess Buffy reruns will have to do.

With recent MTA budget cuts and fare increases across the board to come next year, soon riding the New York City subway will be a privilege reserved for the few that can afford it. Somewhere along the way, the city's travelers will transfer from whatever line they're riding on to an express train as vast as space and as timeless as infinity. It lies between the pit of man's fear and the summit of his knowledge. Via the seminal Tofutti Break, those passengers will be riding the subway known as The Douchebag Express. Click here to ride it.

Sixty-four percent of the way through Minnesota's recount in the Senate race between Republican Norm Coleman and Democrat Al Franken, the conservative remains ahead by 120 votes, about half his original lead. Unlike the hateful and anxious conflict over Florida's recount in 2000, this Minnesota recount is nothing more than a pleasure, with fun disputed ballots and two candidates willing to humiliate themselves to get any vote counted. Minnesota Public Radio has more disputed ballots for you to weigh in on, and while they can't top the classic Lizard People write-in vote, they demand your democratic attention:

Challenged ballots in Florida smell like senior citizens, but challenged ballots in Minnesota are brisk, cold, and snappy. Things were looking good for Al Franken's chances of overcoming Coleman's tiny lead, but he needs more help to secure a victory. That's why every single controversial ballot is eliciting a challenge from both campaigns, no matter how small the question may be.

Challenged ballots from Day 3 of counting don't display quite that same level of ingenuity as the genius of the Lizard People ballot, but it is amazing what each campaign will resort to arguing:

The Franken campaign decided to challenge this ballot, arguing that because the voter had made an X, that he wanted to rescind his vote for Coleman.

The Coleman campaign challenged this ballot, arguing that the voter was indicating a vote for Coleman.

Then there was this Anoka County voter's ballot, pulled out of a stack by the Republicans just because of the beauty of its verse:

You Need to/ Make Voting/ Easier to do/ This is/ Ridiculous/ enough with the/ Political Ads/ This is/ What Happens/ when you/ Bombard Me/ with them/ Al Franken and/ Norm Coleman/ Are So Annoying/ They're Repugnant/ From Now on/ Ill Give up/ My Right/ to vote/ if I got/ Beet down with/ Political Ads/ Advertise That/ Minnesota/ Id Rather/ Have/ Nick/ DiPalo/ For/ President/ Ha/ Ha/ Ha/ Ha/ Ha

Clearly not everyone is enjoying this protracted political process as much as we are.

The intensity of the recount challenges has increased as the gap between the vote totals narrows: according to Nate Silver, the latest ballots are challenged by the Franken campaign at a rate of 7.5 out of every 10,000 ballots, and the Coleman campaign is questioning 7.2 out of every 10,000. As we knew all along, it's gonna be so close we can taste the bitter wisps of democracy on our tongues.

Adults don't have Sesame Street, they just have Suze Orman and James Cramer and other financial wizards to turn to for life advice. We're forced to look in other places for common-sense tips during tough economic times, like magazines, prositutes, and of course sitcoms. The most recent episode of The Office presented an instructive example: Dunder Mifflin salesman Jim Halpert bought a house for his new bride-to-be Pam Beasley. Did he make the right call in investing in the Scranton real estate market, and what did he probably pay to make his parents' former residence stay in the Halpert family' Plus, deleted scenes from this week's episode.

Fresh off the disappointment of not being able to learn Flash, let alone PHP or Drupal, Scranton's Pam Beasley passively aggressively expressed her general displeasure with life by writing a mean note from "Disappointed" to whoever left a disgusting mess in the microwave. We feel for you, Pam.

Jim couldn't sense Pam's unhappiness. He was more worried about how she'd react to the awesome big decision he made without ever telling his partner. Males not named Tony Soprano would risk having their balls severed for the gesture, but in this moving clip Jenna Fischer was totally walled off, implying either a subtle shout-out to Monica Bellucci's famous scene in Irreversible, or that she just can't act:

We talked to a trusted real estate advisor about Jam's new property. He priced the house at around $125,000, while noting it could go for less given the market. Although an earlier scene revealed that the house wasn't in the nicest of neighborhoods, the block looked like it had been kept up. "The exterior is pleasant enough," said our expert. He also noted the tiny windows in the bedroom, the remnants of a particular home-building trend that now looks severely outdated. It's not the most beautiful house in the free world, but that's not the point. "Land is never a bad investment," noted our expert as he described the good sense Jim Halpert had in living many years without anything in the way of expenses or dependents other than dinners with Rashida Jones at TGIFriday's.

And hey, Jim's right, the garage gets a lot of light and will make a great studio. Really, Pam should have been jumping for joy. The only thing most people can be sure of getting this Christmas season is the stomach flu.

In the first of two deleted scenes, Pam tells the truth:

In the second, Michael tries to finger other members of the office for his malfeasance:

newVideoPlayer("/Red_Eye_Belg_Combo.flv", 506, 423,""); What did Belgium do to Red Eye's Andrew Levy' We've never really given the country much thought, to be honest. But apparently someone at Fox News' second funniest late-night offering has been deeply offended by the nation and wants revenge. Did you know the Belgians murdered Paddington Bear and are so stupid they fish for cows' We're guessing that Greg Gutfeld (or one of his writers) was either stabbed or dumped in Belgium. Or he's still not over his Chimay hangover. (Thanks go to intern Shannon for the clip!)

• Hot dog! We have a wiener! And it's Hillary Clinton, who may or may not have been offered and may or may not accept the job of Secretary of State. Whee!
• A famous blogger is in trouble with the law!
• Happy TV Christmas and Thanksgiving everyone!
• Ashley Dupre is back! She's on TV and everything! We have advice for her.
• Al-Qaeda called our new president names and a douchebag sued over getting called a douchebag.
• Another week, another opportunity to just write PUPPIES!
• Next week, Bill O'Reilly will take on beatniks. Did you know they listen to jazz'
• Katie Couric tried some more GOTCHA JOURNALISM with Dave.
• Soon Anna Wintour may be out of job! But, like, maybe voluntarily. Unlike you and everyone else in the nation. There's always Dubai.

This weekend is going to be a bit shorter than usual thanks to Chinese Democracy coming out Sunday and the American Music Awards happening Sunday night, so I figured I'd leave you with a snippet of a discussion that I had with Pitchfork's Marc Hogan, where I attempted to figure out why the indie-heavy stretch of that Blender albums list rubbed me the not-right way earlier today: "I guess maybe part of what I'm also trying (clumsily) to say is that I miss the days of the lost major-label gem' The good album that wasn't by a megastar (either major-label 'celebrity' level or Jenny Lewis 'covered by every music publication' level'you can sub Lucinda Williams in for JL if you want) that was still worthy of recognition' That middle seems to have been lost in the great polarization between 'music-related celebrities' and 'people who really mean it, man,' and it's a shame, because there are still tons of worthy albums out there that could have used the boost. (Maybe I'm drawing too much on personal experience here, but I do think these lists have some power, still, in this every-ear-for-itself age.)" But am I expecting too much from a wrapup that's ultimately the result of a slightly massaged consensus'

I'd say yes and no. On the one hand, there are always those instances where "consensus picks" get where they are not because they're great, but because they're solid enough to be mentioned by a quorum of voters, and a list that's essentially the result of groupthink kind of has to have those picks. And I know that some of my questioning this stuff is a result of feeling kind of alienated by Death Cab For Cutie being "approved" by people who I sort of consider my peers and Ne-Yo not. But what really surprised me was the lack of curveballs. Sure, this could be due in part to my immersion in these debates, but I was genuinely struck, at least on the Blender list, at how those albums that didn't fall within the seeming "default" genre of critic-approved Authentic Music wound up being something of a default pick—Metallica was the metal album of choice, Taylor Swift country, Usher (inexplicably) the R & B selection, etc. Pretty much any example of deviation was in a way completely expected (save perhaps Randy Newman), an odd occurrence in a year that was marked by a lot of talk about how there was "so much music out there." (And on another personal note, there are a bunch of albums that, to me, sounded interesting and existed sorta under-the-radar: The Academy Is... and Solange, to name two. Also that the Portishead album got ignored by both publications whose lists we covered today is something that, frankly, boggles the mind.)

Maybe I'm starting to feel that the big bolt-from-heaven omnibus lists, despite providing so much fodder for arguments and pageviews, need a little more contextualization, like how they're put together or even just like some sort of "here's what almost made it" sidebar. (Hey, being reminded of those just-below-the-radar artists would have the added bonus of jogging memories in a time when the promotion of most cultural phenomena seems to stop at 12:01 a.m. on said phenomena's release date.) To its credit, Blender does have something like a billion song selections scattered throughout its year-end issue; hell, maybe the curated-playlist idea will trump the best-album-rundown one in the end, what with attention spans these days being shorter than ever.

I worry that this whole post is super-inside-baseball (even if people love arguing over the lists themselves), and I should back away from the computer since I'm going to have to return within 40-ish hours or so to talk about Chinese Democracy. But I suspect that someone out there might have an opinion—the Top Five Problems With End-Of-Year Listmaking, even' Ha ha ha.

Earlier: "Blender" Would Like To Remind You That It Really Enjoys Lil Wayne's Music

(P.S.: Yes, I know that I use emphasis quotes too much. Sorry about that.)

Customers have been taking to the Internet to catalog their numerous complaints regarding Rhino's recent New Order reissues, so the company has apparently pulled the discs from sale until the issues can be resolved. Peter Hook, as seems to be his current habit, blogged his ire when the reissues hit shelves in England last month, saying that the band didn't have a chance to hear the discs' final mixes. Still, the American release soldiered on Tuesday, only to have the same complaints surface here. Some of the bonus tracks sound to me like vinyl rips instead of master recordings, which is very strange unless Shaun Ryder stole the originals from some Factory vault back in the day and sold them for hash. (Hey, it's possible.) Somehow, I'd like to blame Edgar Bronfman, whose Warner Music is the parent company of re-issuer Rhino, which has made its name as a loving caretaker of music history. But regardless of who's to blame, this debacle is embarrassing to everyone involved and irritating to those who went out and purchased the discs to begin with. [Billboard]

You know something's up when an article titled "The ugly truth: Matthew Sweet draws puny crowd in S.F." hits Google News. While one man's irritation with Matthew Sweet's show in San Francisco last night might not be terribly important, that man's post does prompt the question of what we should expect from our minor alternative stars of the '90s.

Not only was the crowd dismal at the Great American Music Hall last night (the author estimates 200 attendees at a venue that holds 600), the show didn't wow those who decided to attend.

Given that it was just an intimate gathering among friends, it would have been nice to see Sweet cut loose, take some requests, maybe play a few Velvet Crush songs. Instead, he and the band just cranked out the same 13 songs they've been playing every night on tour, followed by the same two encores, followed by the same final encore. The evening began slowly with three from Sweet's hit-and-miss new 'Sunshine Lies' disc but peaked halfway through with, naturally, two songs from 'Girlfriend': 'I've Been Waiting' and the title track.

Sweet's singing was hampered by a respiratory bug ' at one point he said, 'I'm dying of pneumonia' ' and that condition was all too evident on quieter numbers like 'Someone to Pull the Trigger.' The rockers worked better, though the three-guitar/bass/drum attack got old. How 'bout bringing an acoustic guitar or a keyboard or a pedal steel out on the road to mix things up, Matt'

People get sick, so what can you do about that, but despite my undying love for Girlfriend (and even some of his material since), I probably would have felt a little cheated as well by that particular show, although I'm not entirely sure why. Sweet has released seven solo albums since Girlfriend and two other albums with collaborators, but even the tone of this post gives the sense that audiences feel like Sweet is still following up on a breakthrough from 1991. I was pretty psyched about PM Dawn's debut back then as well, but seeing as they haven't released much of interest since, if they came chugging through town, I wouldn't give attending much of a thought.

Sadly, things might have worked out better for Sweet at this point if he would have given up on music for awhile and returned toting Girlfriend as a classic album and playing it from start to finish. Instead, he's been plugging away since then, with the goodwill of power pop fans in hand, and that sadly brings a diminishing-returns effect—when you're always around, it hampers the possibility of letting nostalgia kick in among former bands. (Even I have to admit that I would be more excited for a Velvet Crush bill at this point, which seems really unfair to Sweet's own talent and discography.)

What are these acts supposed to do, then' Get desk jobs for a few years until they're recognized as forgotten geniuses and can return to big crowds at an All Tomorrow's Parties-sponsored show' Can Matthew Sweet types make it working smaller clubs instead of theaters'

The ugly truth: Matthew Sweet draws puny crowd in S.F. [A&E Interactive]

Let's use this opportunity to think what other popular musical artists could have likenesses of themselves rendered in candy that has some sort of punny significance. A silhouette of Evan Dando made from Lemonheads' The members of Vampire Weekend rendered in Nerds' Something that we could refer to as "The Great Kit Kat"' Surely I'm missing a few possibilities here. [StreetCred.com]

Billy Corgan, in his latest attempt to be seen as a total nutball by pretty much anyone who liked him during the '90s, is saying that Eddie Vedder's song about the Cubs maybe winning the World Series "killed that shit dead... Eddie ain't living here to write a song about my fuckin' team." Funny, I thought that Ryan Dempster and an anemic performance by the Cubs' offense were more to blame, but maybe Billy isn't big on reading the boxscores. [Home Run Derby via Vulture]

Ticketmaster may be engaging in a couple of isolated experiments where it does away with marking up the cost of its tickets through added surcharges, but don't worry, capitalist types: The charges, which have the potential to inflate the cost of a night out by, um, a lot, aren't going away completely. Instead, they're just being rolled into the face value of the ticket—because hey, executives have to eat too, right'

But during Wednesday's "Two Tickets to Paradise" panel, Live Nation executive vp business development and strategy Greg Bettinelli said the eliminated convenience fees still will factor into ticket prices. Even so, Ticketmaster senior vp Joseph Freeman noted that concertgoers likely will be less agitated if add-on fees don't appear on their credit card bills.

"I've had so many family and friends tell me over the years that they'll happily pay $100 for a ticket, but the $90-plus-$10 drives them bonkers," Freeman said.

Tickets.com chief commercial officer Derek Palmer agreed that additional ticket charges will not go away because "there are actual costs involved," he said. "We spend millions of dollars every year in infrastructure to provide these technologies."

Millions, do you hear' (Although couldn't that amount be grossed by, I don't know, one Madonna tour's worth of surcharges') Expect to spend more on tickets—unless, of course, you hit the secondary market, where tickets these days are going for way below face value, as one secondary reseller tells it:

Meanwhile, on the secondary market, TicketNetwork CEO Don Vaccaro said, "we're seeing a greater amount of tickets being sold for less than face value, which is a very bad trend. At the end of the day, consumers feel that they're paying too much for tickets at the boxoffice when they see the secondary market selling tickets for less. It's embarrassing for some artists and teams."

On the flip side, secondary ticketing Web sites are seeing more traffic from concertgoers "because they know that they will get great seats, and for much less than what the primary sellers charge them," Vaccaro said.

Something seems off with the economics here, no' It's like as if a factory outlet of an overpriced store was overtaking its store in sales, and all the while the people at top were ignoring lessons about things like price elasticity.

Ticketmaster charges to stay — in some way [Billboard via Hollywood Reporter]

Paste's 2008 best-of isn't unlike the magazine itself: largely predictable, but with a few surprises seemingly thrown in to confuse or distract. The list hews rather closely to their adult alternative aesthetic, but as likely obligated by law, they threw in Lil Wayne (No. 29). He's not quite as good as MGMT, in case you were wondering.

THE GOOD: It cheered my heart to see that Ida Maria's Fortress Round My Heart placed highly (No. 13); the odd, but charming acknowledgment of Torche (No. 34) elicited a similar reaction. For the Christian rock enthusiast portion of my heart, seeing Sandra McCracken buried near the bottom of the list was nice, although almost a wink and a nod to those who wonder if Paste is a undercover Christian rock mag. They may recommend Lil Wayne, but don't worry, true believers. They still have room for Jesus rock.
THE BAD: Im sure any Idolator reader could pick out a record they don't particularly care for and go all critically nutzoid, but Girl Talk at No. 7 seems like an odd slap in the face to the parade of "real musicians" who fall afterwards. I like Girl Talk; I downloaded the disc, and it stayed in my car stereo for a few months. But the question ends up being whether these best of lists are really running down the "best" of the year, and that the idea of lasting value and meaning is taken into consideration, or whether a disc's inclusion just means that it was awesome to hear at parties.
THE WHAAA' Although I was surprised not to see Al Green on the list, and to note that Santogold's Diplo mixtape outranked her actual album, nothing could top my shock to see She & Him at No. 1. The magazine defends the selection: "Maybe it's just a sweet little folk record'a tiny, flawless diamond. Or maybe it's a pristine distillation of harmony and craft; 50 years of songwriting experience served up on a spinning silver platter. Either way, it's our album of the year." To my ears, neither assertion is true. Volume One is a cute novelty record that has more preciousness than innovation, skill, or any other sort of metric people tend to judge great albums by. Last year's number one was the National's Boxer... this year's pick is a long slide down in quality.

1. She & Him, Volume One
2. Sigur Rós, Med sud i eyrum vid spilum endalaust
3. Vampire Weekend, Vampire Weekend
4. Bon Iver, For Emma, Forever Ago
5. Okkervil River - The Stand Ins
6. Fleet Foxes, Fleet Foxes
7. Girl Talk, Feed the Animals
8. Sun Kil Moon, April
9. Lucinda Williams, Little Honey
10. Deerhunter, Microcastle
11. The Hold Steady, Stay Positive
12. Of Montreal, Skeletal Lamping
13. Ida Maria, Fortress Round My Heart
14. Langhorne Slim, Langhorne Slim
15. Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, Dig!!! Lazarus Dig!!!
16. My Morning Jacket', Evil Urges
17. Bonnie 'Prince' Billy, Lie Down In The Light
18. Death Cab' for Cutie, Narrow Stairs'
19. Gentleman Jesse and His Men, Introducing Gentleman Jesse and His Men
20. Hot Chip, Made In The Dark
21. The Raveonettes, Lust Lust Lust
22. No Age, Nouns
23. Mates of State, Re-Arrange Us
24. Santogold and Diplo, Top Ranking'
25. Mugison, Mugiboogie
26. Lee Ann Womack, Call Me Crazy
27. Liam Finn, I'll Be Lightning
28. MGMT, Oracular Spectacular
29. Lil Wayne, Tha Carter III
30. I'm From Barcelona, Who Killed Harry Houdini'
31. The Walkmen, You & Me
32. Silver Jews, Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea
33. Santogold, Santogold
34. Torche, Meanderthal
35. Colour Revolt, Plunder, Beg and Curse
36. The Bridges, Limits of the Sky
37. Johnny Flynn & The Sussex Wit, A Larum
38. Jamie Lidell, Jim
39. The Dodos, Visiter
40. Flight of the Conchords, Flight of the Conchords
41. The Tallest Man On Earth, Shallow Grave
42. Thao Nguyen and the Get Down Stay Down, We Brave Bee Stings & All
43. Amanda Palmer, Who Killed Amanda Palmer
44. Kathleen Edwards, Asking For Flowers
45. M83, Saturdays = Youth
46. Lykke Li, Youth Novels
47. Laura Marling, Alas, I Cannot Swim
48. REM, Accelerate
49. Sandra McCracken, Red Balloon
50. TV On The Radio, Dear Science

Signs of Life 2008: Best Music [Paste]

Despite my previous issues with the Phoenix New Times, I was actually excited to see what appeared to be wide-ranging coverage of the local Juggalo community this week. Many of us don't understand the phenomenon at all. And with seemingly thousands of Faygo-chugging malcontents around these parts, there had to be a story there. Right'

Sorta. Newish music editor Martin Cizmar talked to a few members of the species, who defended themselves as being "just family," and then talked to cops, who see Juggalos as operating in a somewhat ganglike fashion because they congregate in groups and, you know, commit crimes (a premise the story's headline dismisses). Then all of a sudden, as if Cizmar hit a word count limit, the story ends.

Hanging out by the bus station at Metrocenter (not at the actual stop, where Juggalos say transit security hassles them), they do seem like a family, though a dysfunctional one. Balls are busted, stories told, song lyrics quoted. Cops roll up, and the kids get quiet. Someone suggests that anyone holding or anyone with an outstanding warrant bounce, but no one moves. The cops pull aside one girl to talk to her, then release her back to the crowd. The afternoon goes on, just a bunch of kids with nothing to do. As I go to leave, one kid says, "Come back tomorrow. We hang out at this church, and there's free pizza."

Free pizza' Sounds like my kind of gang. Woop-woop.

Huh' The story seems really incomplete. What about the band attracts the fans' What does the band think' Are there any other acts with similar weird vaguely criminal fanbases' You'd think Cizmar would have an inside track on that info—since he used to roll with the Juggalos. Not surprisingly, he downplays that association these days.

In the interest of full disclosure, this was not my first time wearing an ICP shirt. And the last time was not done with a detached air of superiority. The last time I wore one was 10 years ago, in Ohio, where I'm from ' and it was not a big deal. We went to shows, wearing the shirts and face-paint, carrying the distinctive three liters of Faygo soda that Juggalos drink. The concerts were fantastic: violent, sexually depraved rhymes rapped over dumpy beats, with a bunch of sketchy dudes moshing and heavily tattooed girls ' usually a little sloppy in the face ' flashing. At age 17, who wouldn't love it'

The whole enterprise falls a bit short, using space that could have been used to actually tell a story to review Faygo. Even if the reporting isn't top notch, at least the New Times comes through with an online slideshow. Print, dead' Not dead exactly, but occasionally a little less responsive than it should be.

Insane Clown Posse's Juggalos Aren't a Gang ' Just Punk Kids [Phoenix New Times]

Guy Peellaert, the Belgian artist probably best known to rock fans as the artist behind the cover for David Bowie's Diamond Dogs, died on Monday in Paris. Peellaert was an accomplished comic strip artist who designed posters for films like Taxi Driver and Paris, Texas as well as the decidedly creepy cover for the Bowie album, which at first included visible genitalia for Bowie's man/dog. Peellaert's book with writer Nik Cohn, Rock Dreams, sold a million copies (thanks in part to Columbia House); the "fantasy tribute to rock and roll and R & B" imagined meetings between rock icons and contained pastels of a bathing Jim Morrison. Peellaert was 74. [homepage]

An appeals court in Berlin has overturned a lower court's decision that producer Moses Pelham was in the wrong for sampling two seconds of Kraftwerk's "Metal on Metal" on a 1997 track. The ruling sends the case back down to a lower court, although you have to think somewhere Gregg Gillis is celebrating. The higher court stated that the amount of the song sampled was insignificant, and that the sample was used in a manner significantly different than the original track. What difference does this make in the long run' Probably not much, although if you listen to the track "Metal On Metal" was part of against Kraftwerk's will (both tracks are below the cut), you might understand why those robots were pissed.

Sabrina Setlur, "Nur mir":

Kraftwerk, "Metal on Metal":

Kraftwerk sample case overturned [BBC]

In the annals of popular music, certain albums stand out for their sheer percentage of hit-bound material. Michael Jackson's Thriller is the most famous, not just because it spun off seven Top 10 singles'the first album to do so'but because the whole disc had only nine tracks. That's a stunning 78% hit ratio. Shania Twain's Come on Over, roughly 70% of which charted on the country and pop charts over the course of two years, is nearly as legendary. More recently, Rihanna has mined just over half of Good Girl Gone Bad for a string of hits.

Normally, feats like these are the result of months of patient promotion, as singles are promoted one by one'lined up for release to radio like planes on a slow-moving runway.

When you're an 18-year-old country-pop phenomenon, however, things move a lot faster.

For the first time in months, the most oft-recurring name on Billboard's Hot 100 isn't ubiquitous rapper Lil Wayne. It's Taylor Swift, who appears with seven songs this week, six of them brand-new to the chart.

We've seen this chart ubiquity happen several times this year'not just with Weezy but with American Idol winner David Cook and the Jonas Brothers. What's unprecedented is just how much of an individual Swift album has now made the chart.

Eat your heart out, Michael: just one week after it debuted in stores, Swift's Fearless is 85% hit.

To be clear: 11 out of the 13 songs on Swift's sophomore disc'which only went on sale two Tuesdays ago'have reached the Hot 100. With the exception of the one song that's a huge country-radio hit ('Love Story,' No. 1 at Hot Country Songs for a second week), every last one of these 'hits' made its chart debut thanks to digital sales, not airplay.

Swift's Universal Music Group-distributed label Big Machine decided last summer to launch the album with a string of prerelease digital singles, mimicking the approach used to great effect by Lil Wayne and the Jonas Brothers.

For the Jonases, Disney conducted a coordinated battle plan over the summer, issuing a series of prerelease iTunes singles'four in total'every two weeks leading up to their August album debut. But Swift did her ex-boyfriend Joe Jonas one better, dropping five songs between August and late October.

With rabid teen fanbases, both the Jonases and Swift did extremely well on the charts: all four of the boys' prelease singles, and all five of hers, debuted within the Top 20 of the Hot 100, with first-week iTunes sales totals above 100,000. For Swift, all five of these hits' 'Change,' 'Love Story,' 'Fearless,' 'You're Not Sorry' and 'You Belong With Me''peaked at higher positions than her previous pop-chart high-water mark, set earlier this year by the No. 13 pop crossover hit 'Teardrops on My Guitar." Most of the songs proved to be short-lived 'hits,' but the point was to make a splash and set up the album, not score long-lasting hit singles.

The plan worked like a charm: Fearless just debuted on the album chart this week at No. 1, with sales of nearly 600,000, the year's best total for a country album (and a higher total than the squeal-worthy Jonases pulled with their disc).

But in a sign of how insatiable Swift's fanbase is for her new diary entries, she's still scoring insta-hits after her album's release. Her six debuts this week don't beat any records; Miley Cyrus alter ego Hannah Montana pulled a similar number of debuts a couple of years ago. But there's no precedent in chart history for an act to score that many debuts after already scoring five more in the months immediately prior.

So, just for the record, here are all of Swift's chart hits from the Fearless album, with highest chart position in parentheses (in all cases except 'Love Story,' the peak position came in the song's debut week). This week's six debuts are listed last:

'Change' (No. 10)
'Love Story' (No. 5)
'Fearless' (No. 9)
'You're Not Sorry' (No. 11)
'You Belong with Me' (No. 12)
'White Horse' (No. 13)
'Forever & Always' (No. 49)
'The Way I Loved You' (No. 72)
'Fifteen' (No. 79)
'Breathe' (No. 87)
'Hey Stephen' (No. 94)

Swift's 11-for-13 score from a single album was, until this week, unimaginable even for a superstar like Michael Jackson. (Makes me wonder: How lame are those last two songs' I guess 'Tell Me Why' and 'The Best Day' will go down as Fearless' versions of 'Baby Be Mine' and 'The Lady in My Life.') On the Digital Songs list, 10 tracks from Swift's new album appear, with download totals ranging from 11,000 for 'You Belong with Me' to 124,000 for 'White Horse.'

Obviously, as I've said here before, the strange song economy created by iTunes'where any song for sale, including an unpromoted album cut, is capable of charting'has upended our entire notion of what a 'hit' is.

But I also think this event says something about the fluidity with which a younger generation consumes music. Nearly 600,000 people paid full price for Swift's album last week, both in stores and online; but in the same period, nearly as many people (about 400,000) spent 99 cents for one of her songs instead. Are they building the album a buck at a time' If they're under 18, it's likely that they are. (Although in this freaky economy, it's also possible some adult fans are buying Fearless on the installment plan).

In the last couple of decades, we've seen the album as one-hit-wonder, and its opposite, the album as multi-single aircraft carrier'from Michael to Madonna to Shania. Perhaps Taylor Swift represents another new model entirely: the album as buffet.

Here's a rundown of the rest of this week's charts:

• Remember when I said a couple of weeks ago that Beyoncé stood a good chance of scoring another Top 10 hit, the week after her album dropped' Looks like she's about to do better than that: 'Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It),' currently No. 28 on the Hot 100, is poised to leap to No. 1 next week. That would pull it ahead of its sister single, the No. 3'peaking 'If I Were a Boy.'

In the weeklong promotional push for her album release, B has been flogging both songs anyplace that will have her, including Saturday Night Live and the finale of MTV's TRL. The difference is, 'Boy' has been available as a digital single for weeks, while 'Ladies' only became available this Tuesday, when I Am'Sasha Fierce landed on iTunes.

Just as we saw in September with T.I. and Rihanna's 'Live Your Life,' which surged when T.I.'s album hit iTunes, pent-up demand works like a charm'as of this writing, 'Ladies' is already iTunes' top-selling song. And 'Ladies' has 'Boy' beat at radio, too: the former is now the eighth most-played song across genres, leapfrogging over the latter, which is stalled in 11th place in spins. As a kind of appetizer for her predicted Hot 100 triumph, 'Ladies' this week reaches the top of another major chart: Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, where it becomes her fifth solo No. 1.

You might have expected a torchy ballad like 'Boy' to do better at radio and iTunes. What gave the uptempo jam 'Ladies' the edge' Was it the Robot-Sasha hand' All things being equal, I have to give it to Samberg and Timberlake.

• By leaping into the Modern Rock Top 10 with 'Love Hurts''a late-breaking single from a two-year-old album'Incubus joins very elite company. This is their 12th visit to the winners' circle, placing Incubus among the 10 acts with the most Top 10s in this chart's 20-year history. In case you're curious, here's the list as it now stands, with each band's number of Modern Rock Top 10s in parentheses:

U2 (22)
Red Hot Chili Peppers (20)
Green Day (17)
Smashing Pumpkins (17)
Foo Fighters (15)
The Offspring (15)
Pearl Jam (15)
R.E.M. (15)
Incubus (12)
Linkin Park (12)

The one way Incubus has all the rest of these bands beat' Consistency. Only one of their 13 charting Modern Rock hits missed the Top 10. (That would be 2005's 'Make a Move,' which peaked at No. 17 and appeared on the soundtrack to the summer megabomb Stealth.)

• It's been available to radio stations for a month now, but the decision to make 'Chinese Democracy' available on iTunes finally brings Guns N' Roses back to the Hot 100, as sales of 57,000 result in a No. 34 debut. As Al Shipley noted, the title track of the year's most shocking album release has emerged as a solid rock-radio hit, but that airplay isn't enough to register on the all-genre Hot 100 Airplay list yet.

For the record, 'Chinese' is Guns' first appearance on the big pop chart since 1994, when the band's ill-advised cover of 'Sympathy for the Devil' peaked at No. 55. (That was from the soundtrack to the Tom Cruise'Brad Pitt vehicle Interview with the Vampire.) And by debuting in the 30s, 'Chinese' is the band's first Top 40 hit since 1992, when 'November Rain' peaked at No. 3.

Top 10s
Last week's position and total weeks charted in parentheses (Digital Songs chart includes total downloads/percentage change in parentheses):

Hot 100
1. T.I. feat. Rihanna, "Live Your Life" (LW No. 1, 8 weeks)
2. T.I., "Whatever You Like" (LW No. 2, 15 weeks)
3. Beyoncé, "If I Were a Boy" (LW No. 5, 6 weeks)
4. Katy Perry, "Hot N Cold" (LW No. 3, 16 weeks)
5. Pink, "So What" (LW No. 6, 13 weeks)
6. Kevin Rudolf feat. Lil Wayne, "Let It Rock" (LW No. 8, 12 weeks)
7. Britney Spears, "Womanizer" (LW No. 7, 7 weeks)
8. Akon, "Right Now (Na Na Na)" (LW No. 10, 8 weeks)
9. Kanye West, "Love Lockdown" (LW No. 13, 9 weeks)
10. Jason Mraz, "I'm Yours" (LW No. 9, 31 weeks)

Hot Digital Songs
1. Beyoncé, "If I Were a Boy" (LW No. 4, 170,000 downloads)
2. T.I. feat. Rihanna, "Live Your Life" (LW No. 2, 168,000 downloads)
3. Katy Perry, "Hot N Cold" (LW No. 7, 130,000 downloads)
4. Kevin Rudolf feat. Lil Wayne, "Let It Rock" (LW No. 5, 128,000 downloads)
5. Taylor Swift, "White Horse" (CHART DEBUT, 124,000 downloads)
6. Britney Spears, "Womanizer" (LW No. 6, 121,000 downloads)
7. Kanye West, "Heartless" (LW No. 1, 119,000 downloads)
8. Akon, "Right Now (Na Na Na)" (LW No. 8, 116,000 downloads)
9. Kanye West, "Love Lockdown" (LW No. 11, 112,000 downloads)
10. T.I., "Whatever You Like" (LW No. 9, 103,000 downloads)

Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs
1. Beyoncé, "Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It)" (LW No. 5, 6 weeks)
2. T.I. feat. Rihanna, "Live Your Life" (LW No. 4, 10 weeks)
3. Ne-Yo, "Miss Independent" (LW No. 1, 17 weeks)
4. Jennifer Hudson, "Spotlight" (LW No. 2, 27 weeks)
5. T.I., "Whatever You Like" (LW No. 3, 18 weeks)
6. Jazmine Sullivan, "Bust Your Windows" (LW No. 9, 10 weeks)
7. T-Pain feat. Lil Wayne, "Can't Believe It," (LW No. 6, 19 weeks)
8. Lil Wayne feat. Bobby Valentino, "Mrs. Officer" (LW No. 7, 20 weeks)
9. Jazmine Sullivan, "Need U Bad" (LW No. 8, 29 weeks)
10. John Legend feat. Andre 3000, "Green Light" (LW No. 10, 13 weeks)

Hot Country Songs
1. Taylor Swift, "Love Story" (LW No. 1, 10 weeks)
2. Zac Brown Band, "Chicken Fried" (LW No. 2, 22 weeks)
3. Montgomery Gentry, "Roll with Me" (LW No. 5, 17 weeks)
4. Tim McGraw, "Let It Go" (LW No. 3, 18 weeks)
5. Sugarland, "Already Gone" (LW No. 6, 12 weeks)
6. Rascal Flatts, "Here" (LW No. 7, 11 weeks)
7. Carrie Underwood, "Just a Dream" (LW No. 4, 19 weeks)
8. Brad Paisley with Keith Urban, "Start a Band" (LW No. 8, 10 weeks)
9. Craig Morgan, "Love Remembers" (LW No. 12, 28 weeks)
10. Bucky Covington, "I'll Walk" (LW No. 11, 30 weeks)

Hot Modern Rock Tracks
1. The Offspring, "You're Gonna Go Far, Kid" (LW No. 1, 17 weeks)
2. Kings of Leon, "Sex on Fire" (LW No. 2, 13 weeks)
3. Apocalyptica feat. Adam Gontier, "I Don't Care" (LW No. 4, 20 weeks)
4. Rise Against, "Re-Education (Through Labor)" (LW No. 3, 13 weeks)
5. Weezer, "Troublemaker" (LW No. 5, 19 weeks)
6. The Killers, "Human" (LW No. 6, 8 weeks)
7. Shinedown, "Second Chance" (LW No. 7, 9 weeks)
8. Incubus, "Love Hurts" (LW No. 16, 5 weeks)
9. Metallica, "The Day That Never Comes" (LW No. 8, 13 weeks)
10. Theory of a Deadman, "Bad Girlfriend" (LW No. 9, 22 weeks)

Lucas' IMterview with an anonymous person straddling the world of Christian and indie brought up some affection for Anathallo, an act walking that same tightrope. Their first album for once-hipster-beloved label Anticon hit stores on Tuesday while I was otherwise occupied, but I'd be remiss if I didn't tell you that it's worth a listen for anyone who would like their indie folk mixed with sweet harmonies, autoharp, and a barrage of instruments usually left to orchestras. (I didn't notice any Autotune, but you can't have everything.) [MySpace]

'In this world of ever evolving genres, sounds and trends, the word phenomenon is rarely if ever used,' Deadmau5's bio unreliably asserts. Except in the case of, uh, this clearly phenomenal fellow, whose new album on Ultra, randomly titled Random Album Title, entered the Heatseekers chart at No. 65 last week, then dropped off this week. (His Clockwork EP did debut on Hot Singles Sales at No. 17 in its stead, though.) Very informative explanation of his music, from his Wiki page: 'Deadmau5 (pronounced 'Dead mouse', birth name Joel Zimmerman) is a Progressive house and Electro house musician and DJ from Toronto, Canada. His extensive discography includes tracks such as 'Arguru' and 'Not Exactly.'' Got that' You may call him Mau5y, you may call him Zimmy, but you're gonna have to serve somebody.

And he's recorded tons of music, including two songs you never heard of before. Cool! Also, he has a record label called Mau5trap. His symbol, or logo, or whatever, is indeed a mou5e, midway between Mickey Mou5e and a computer mou5e, yet seemingly not dead. (Or Mode5t, for that matter. Or On Mar5. Or, um' Dangerou5.) Seems like he must be a big deal in the world of electronifica, seeing how he's worked with both Sasha and Digweed—not to mention Tiesto, Carl Cox, Laurent Garnier, and other notable techno people whose names I've actually heard before. And you'd be a big deal, too, if your on-stage props included a 'tailor made giant Mau5head complete with powerful strobe lighting eyes that get (your) fans in a frenzy during (your) spellbinding sets.' Said head is clearly visible in the live video for 'Ghosts N Stuff (Hard Intro Version)' (which one comment-writer insists is actually called 'The Reward is Cheese' instead, so take your pick.) Well, actually, the video has two mau5 heads, oddly enough, neither particularly 'giant,' and the mi5e wearing them engage in a wrestling match. Then Deadmau5 works in frightening music such as Vincent Price's evil laughs from 'Thriller' and Chopin's 'Pray For the Dead And The Dead Will Pray For You.' Very goth, not that you'd know that from the frenzied fans. Me, I kinda dig the psychedelic organ stuff that happens between the four and five minute mark. But 9:53 is really long.

Deadmau5 [MySpace]

Perhaps unsurprisingly, given the magazine in question's penchant for featuring him in its pages, Lil Wayne's Tha Carter III topped Blender's year-end list of albums, which has swelled from 25 contenders to 33 for reasons that probably don't involve the vinyl revival (if they did, then where's that extra 1/3'). Full list after the jump, but here are a few thumbnail reactions:

THE GOOD: It's nice to know that someone remembered the early-'08 reissue of Robyn's album (No. 6).
THE BAD: More evidence that indie rock has become the "center" for the music-writing set comes from the 11-19 slots on the list, which (save Al Green) could have been cribbed in part from a the elbo.ws chart. (And yes, I include Katy Perry in that list. Haven't you heard her MGMT cover') Sure, Blender's initial mission of finding some sort of consensus in popular music, and covering every player within said group obsessively, is sorta quaint in the infinite-playlist era, but... I guess I just was hoping for something a little more curveballish than "no, really, My Morning Jacket is great," is all.
THE WHAAA' I would think that the atonal, grueling presence of "Moving Mountains" would disqualify Usher's Here I Stand from any year-end lists that weren't focused on disappointing sales figures from superstar artists. But I'm wrong: It's No. 26 here, right ahead of the similarly soft-selling E=MC2.

1. Lil' Wayne, Tha Carter III
2. Girl Talk, Feed The Animals
3. TV On The Radio, Dear Science
4. Metallica, Death Magnetic
5. Hot Chip, Made In The Dark
6. Robyn
7. Of Montreal, Skeletal Lamping
8. Randy Newman, Harps & Angels
9. Vampire Weekend
10. Fall Out Boy, Folie A Deux
11. Death Cab For Cutie, Narrow Stairs
12. My Morning Jacket, Evil Urges
13. Al Green, Lay It Down
14. Jenny Lewis, Acid Tongue
15. Bon Iver, For Emma, Forever Ago
16. Be Your Own Pet, Get Awkward
17. Conor Oberst
18. Ponytail, Ice Cream Spiritual
19. Katy Perry, One Of The Boys
20. Wale, Mixtape About Nothing
21. Erykah Badu, New Amerykah Part I: Fourth World War
22. Coldplay, Viva La Vida
23. The Cool Kids, Bake Sale
24. The Roots, Rising Down
25. Santogold
26. Usher, Here I Stand
27. Mariah Carey, E=MC2
28. Stephen Malkmus, Real Emotional Trash
29. Raphael Saadiq, The Way I See It
30. Young Jeezy, The Recession
31. Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, Dig!!! Lazarus Dig!!!
32. Taylor Swift, Fearless
33. Hayes Carll, Trouble In Mind

Between the forever-in-the-making epics and the tossed-off odes to sadness and the crazy '80s radio pastiche and a bunch of other albums, next week is going to be something of a big one for the music business. How should one navigate their way through the music-consumption choices they'll be forced to make next week' Might I suggest a friendly game of Buy/Download/Kill, in which each album receives one of the three fates outlined by the game's title. My personal preferences after the jump.

BUY
Guns N' Roses, Chinese Democracy Hey, writing about Axl Rose's magnum opus has paid my bills for the last two years and change. The least I could do is give back.

Kanye West, 808s & Heartbreak: It may be the most divisive album to come out this year, if only because West is one of the few artists left who has a wide-enough fanbase to split through the power of his aesthetic decisions. But you know what' The more I listen, the more I'm coming out on the "pro" side.

The Killers, Day & Age: But wait until it's discounted to The Nice Price.

DOWNLOAD
Ludacris, Theater Of The Mind: Because it'll have at least one instance of Ludacris rolling up his vowels and his consonants in a way that drives me wild.

Barry Manilow, The Greatest Songs Of The '80s: This would go in the "kill" section were it not for the presence of a Journey cover, which I'm going to have to hear at least once for sick curiosity's sake.

The Fireman, Electric Arguments: That first single was straight, um, fire, but one only has so many hours in a day.

KILL
Trace Adkins, X (Ten): Not only did he have to explain that the "X" in his title isn't a reference to sleaze, but a nod to this being his 10th album, any success this album might have will probably result in him recording another awful between-innings anthem. (I suspect others might agree, as country isn't exactly flying off the shelves this year. Unless it's being sung by sparkly-guitar-wielding girls, that is.)

Scott Weiland, "Happy" In Galoshes: Because dude needs help infinitely more than he needs SoundScans.

Nov. 25, 2008 [Pause & Play]
[Thanks to Defamer for the inspiration]