"Yes, but he's no puff," she cried. "He's more of a man than you'll ever be."

It’s the biweekly Billboard bitch!

• Carly Simon looks like she’s wearing a Warhol wig as a hat. Which is a shame, since her dress is really kind of pretty, in a former-hippie kind of way.
  
• Billboard weirds me out because of all of the talk of music as a business, like it could be a trade journal for any industry, or at least any industry with a crap-ton of money. No one talks about the actual music, except in the obligatory reviews. Now, I realize that’s what it’s for, but a girl can only read so many “Why’s the industry in the toilet!?” articles without wanting to yell, “Stop only making shitty music easily available, and charge less for cds, you mooks!”
  
• And I don’t think the chokehold on radio is helping much, either.
  
• I have a stupid question for Bob Geldof: How do free concerts raise $$ for Africa? Is this like how we were all supposed to be surprised by the lack of snow in equatorial countries at Christmas?
  
• A-HEM: “McDonald’s is looking to various fashion houses—Rocawear and Phat Farm—to help revamp its employee uniform.” All the responses are trying to get out at the same time, and my brain is having a traffic jam.
  
• I don’t know what the man on page 9 sounds like, music-wise, but damn he’s pretty. Also on page 9, do alleged pirates like alleged ham?
  
• Things I Never Ever Thought I’d Say: Kelly Clarkson is wearing a really cute shirt on page 28, next to a more-handsome-than-usual Billie Joe Armstrong. Still both unnecessary, however.
  
• And finally, thankfully, someone mentions the obvious in Billboard: if I’m paying out the ass for gas, I can’t go see a $35 show, or buy a $20 album. But of course, that’s not the highlighted quote. The highlighted quote is about getting music not in a record store, because Billboard (and, presumably by extention, the industry) refuse to let there be any other factor in their decline aside from illegal downloading.
  
• Goddam, I hate the Eagles.
  
• I really think that, in the top 25 tours list, they should list ticket price as well. I want to know how many people could see Velvet Revolver for the price of a Rod Stewart ticket. Oh, there it is. Nevermind.
  
• It’s cheaper to get the primo seats for Kylie than to nosebleed it for The Eagles. And I thought that U2 were all stripped back now, no more giant mirrorball lemons and what have you, so why does it cost $50 for their cheap seats? That being said, if I hadn’t already seen BMRC and Interpol, and it was in a convenient locale, and I had a bit more money than usual, and a time machine was involved so that I could see the U2 I wanted to see, $90 doesn’t seem like too much. Of course, than you factor in the convenience charge and I’m in the poorhouse.
  
• And wouldn’t seeing U2 with the Killers just really, really make you want that time machine?
  
• Paul McCartney can kiss my ass. “Now I’ve earned my Wings.” “I knew he was an angel!” “No, this cd of Wings greatest hits!...band on the run…”
  
• That was all for you, Cara.
  
• New Depeche Mode album…interesting.
  
• Danny Elfman writing the score for a Tim Burton movie counts as a news items?
  
• I’ve seen that Hilary Duff liquid icebreakers commercial like 100x in the past three days. It always reminds me of the free sample I got of them, along with a warning, when I bought my history book last summer.
  
• Damn, I wish I could have seen Xiu Xiu. Stupid ALA timing.
  
• Aww, Mos Def. So cute.
  
• Damn, IceT’s wife has some big tits. I mistook her for Mariah Carey, at first.
  Because, really, it’s just not me bitching about Billboard unless I throw in a reference to Carey’s ginormous, unnatural hooters.
  
• Hee, I said hooters.