Christian <a href="http://blog.stereophile.com/stephenmejias/041607listening/">recommended…; a great new band to me: <a href="http://www.thebesnardlakes.com/">The Besnard Lakes</a>. Listening to them reminds me of Brian Wilson and Pink Floyd and My Morning Jacket. There are shiny falsettos, dream sequences, and reverb-drenched solos. It's music that I want to share with my girlfriend. A Google search then led me to the band's record label, <a href="http://www.jagjaguwar.com/">Jagjaguwar</a&gt;. There, I found a happy surprise: entire albums &#151; freely flowing streams of music &#151; not only from The Besnard Lakes, but also from a couple of other interesting bands, <a href="http://www.odawastheband.com/Odawas/Main.html">Odawas</a&gt; and <a href="http://www.alexdeliverymusic.com/">Alex Delivery</a>.

After a week of rain and bad news, here comes the sun. I woke this morning, singing it.

jazz fusion is a movement in music, that I have to say, often leaves me cold. Yeah, <I>Bitches Brew</I> is great and other masterworks of the genre obviously resonate, but shows like a rare appearance by guitarist David Torn that I caught on Tuesday night at Joe's Pub are less than thrilling.

Hendrix and Huckleberry&mdash;heavy party animals!

Queen Bagheera reigns on my parade.

Les Edelberg writes: "First, wanted to thank you for the Jacques Brel link yesterday. He's always been one of my favorites and I still listen to my original vinyl copy regularly. I think this clip is even more powerful than the one you posted Monday."

Whether it does or not, you know you're going to. Eskie lists 60 things worth shortening your life for. I must be boring&mdash;only about 10 appealed to me, although I did find #s 38 & 39 intriguing.