max abelson's super groovy music video spectacular

fine videos daily:
1960s on mon
1970s on tues
1980s on wed
1990s on thurs
2000s on fri


feat. the beatles, aretha franklin, neil young, dr. dre, will oldham, serge gainsbourg, the kinks, harry nilsson, dusty springfield, the clash, the smiths, al green, rolling stones, cat power, yo la tengo, stevie wonder, antony, wilco, elvis, talking heads, elliott smith, jimi hendrix, r.e.m., ray charles, velvet underground, the monochrome set, randy newman, cure & queen


i write for the nyo, live in nyc, am 25, please email here


"mtv makes me want to smoke crack." -beck


see the archives & a random post


"i just happen to be here, and it's okay." -caetano veloso


"sing a simple song but keep the swing strong." -de la soul


"it took me about three or four weeks to toilet train my cat, nightlife. most of the time is spent moving the box very gradually to the bathroom. do it very slowly and don't confuse him." -charles mingus


"she had a chihuahua named carlos that had some kind of skin disease and was totally blind." -tom waits


"hey there, hey now, well, you can make a pacemaker blink, yeah, easy thing, make a man's heart go bibbity bom like a gentle drum. -john cale


"i’ve still got things inside me, sad things, happy things, that people don’t know about." -loretta lynn


"after cheesecake with all of your friends and family, who's gonna front the bill? me... say you want to take first-class trips, well i want to work those first-class hips. yes i do." -r. kelly


"i'm going to boogie my scruples away." -lowell george


"i drive a rolls-royce, cause it's good for my voice." -t.rex


gotta think straight, keep a clean plate." -joanna newsom


"keep a clean nose, watch the plain-clothes." -bob dylan


"my mother used to tell me about vibrations. to think that invisible feelings, invisible vibrations existed scared me to death." -brian wilson


"i could even find it in my heart to love mike love." -belle & sebastian


"think about something else. was art tatum talented?" - shoot the piano player


"i mean every letter in the words in the sentences of my quotes." -lil' wayne


"lyrics choochoo from my mouth like locomotion." - pato banton


"i'm dealing in rock and roll. i'm not a bonafide human being." -phil spector


"at a certain point phil approached me with a bottle of kosher red wine in one hand and a .45 in the other, put his arm around my shoulder and shoved the revolver into my neck and said, 'leonard, i love you.' i said, 'i hope you do, phil.'" -leonard cohen


"they’d whisper at each other and look at phil and whisper at each other. finally this lady, tanked, comes over to phil and says, 'alright, sonny, what’s your problem?' and he said, 'premature ejaculation, what’s yours?'" -tom wolfe


"he's got a mind like a sewer, and a heart like a fridge" -elvis costello


"i bite my nails and if that fails i go get myself stoned, but when i do i think of you and head myself back home." -gram parsons


"i would say groucho marx, to name one thing, and willie mays, and the second movement of the jupiter symphony, and louis armstrong’s recording of potatohead blues, swedish movies, naturally. sentimental education by flaubert, marlon brando, frank sinatra, those incredible apples and pears by cézanne, the crabs at sam wo’s, tracy’s face." -woody allen

"where have you been all my life?" -emmylou harris


"the first time i got stoned on grass was with john paul jones of led zeppelin. we'd been talking to ramblin' jack elliott somewhere and jonesy said to me, 'come over and i'll turn you on to grass.' he had a huge room with nothing in it except this huge vast hammond organ, right next door to the police." -david bowie


brian eno songs that will make good book titles for my 10-volume memoir, in order: here he comes, baby's on fire, golden hours, brutal ardour, taking tiger mountain, events in dense fog, through hollow lands, some of them are old, everything merges with the night, dead finks don’t talk


ry cooder albums that every man should own: into the purple valley, boomer's story, paradise and lunch


#1 song on the white album (tie): long long long, happiness is a warm gun


"the only word is love." -john lennon


thelonious monk's middle name: sphere


"really, we don't want people twiddling their goatees over our stuff." -radiohead


"i love songs about horses, railroads, land, judgment day, family, hard times, whiskey, courtship, marriage, adultery, separation, murder, war, prison, rambling, damnation, home, salvation, death, pride, humor, piety, rebellion, patriotism, larceny, determination, tragedy, rowdiness, heartbreak and love. and mother. and god." -johnny cash


"the moon is clear, the sky is bright, i'm happy as the horse's shite." -the pogues


"i hope that you all out there, young, old, tall, short, fat or thin, quick or slow, no matter what kind or color or shape or person you are, if you like to make music, why, go ahead.” -pete seeger


"but chuck berry isn't merely the greatest of the rock and rollers, or rather, there's nothing mere about it. say rather that unless we can somehow recycle the concept of the great artist so that it supports chuck berry as well as it does marcel proust, we might as well trash it altogether." -robert christgau


mashable.com says about us: "you can expect the unexpected with this awesome gem. groovy." and 33 1/3 says: "it's nice to have someone steer me in a more worthwhile direction."


download albums, see album covers, photos, posters, quotes & 'staches


the olden days: 08 j. f. m. a. m. j. j. a. s. o. n. d. 09 j. f. m. a. m. j. j. a. s. o. n. d. 10 j. f. m. a. m. j. j.


make a tumblr!



Creative Commons License
August 4
“everybody came to the party, and we all have the headache and the hangover. but it’s classically human to say, ‘we lost all this money, it must have been the villain, so let’s find him! let’s string him up. somebody’s got to pay.’ but fortunately, we have a system of laws, not men.” - richard d. parsons, citigroup’s chairman, and the former ceo of time warner, in this week’s new york observer. “as long as the music is playing, you’ve got to get up and dance. we’re still dancing.” - charles o. prince, then citigroup’s ceo, in 2007.

“everybody came to the party, and we all have the headache and the hangover. but it’s classically human to say, ‘we lost all this money, it must have been the villain, so let’s find him! let’s string him up. somebody’s got to pay.’ but fortunately, we have a system of laws, not men.” - richard d. parsons, citigroup’s chairman, and the former ceo of time warner, in this week’s new york observer.

“as long as the music is playing, you’ve got to get up and dance. we’re still dancing.” - charles o. prince, then citigroup’s ceo, in 2007.

Comments (View)
July 28
“my daddy was a bankrobber/ but he never hurt nobody/ he just loved to live that way/ and he loved to steal your money.”

“my daddy was a bankrobber/ but he never hurt nobody/ he just loved to live that way/ and he loved to steal your money.”

Comments (View)
June 14
while you’re admiring the quiffs and cardigans on your wallet pix of the everly brothers, it’s comforting to recall that don and phil didn’t talk to each other for the entire 1970s, except for “family crises” and reunion concerts that ended with don, alone onstage, telling the audience “the everly brothers died ten years ago.”

while you’re admiring the quiffs and cardigans on your wallet pix of the everly brothers, it’s comforting to recall that don and phil didn’t talk to each other for the entire 1970s, except for “family crises” and reunion concerts that ended with don, alone onstage, telling the audience “the everly brothers died ten years ago.”

Comments (View)
April 28
just realized, stupid me, that of course bigmouth strikes again is the smiths song that needed the joan of arc album cover. “as the flames rose, to her roman nose” is the best schnoz-related smiths lyric, better even than “there’s always someone, somewhere, with a big nose, who knows.”

just realized, stupid me, that of course bigmouth strikes again is the smiths song that needed the joan of arc album cover. “as the flames rose, to her roman nose” is the best schnoz-related smiths lyric, better even than “there’s always someone, somewhere, with a big nose, who knows.”

Comments (View)
April 25
“please accept my regrets and apologies, also my best wishes. i’m afraid there’s nothing we can do about the journalists; we can only hope that they will die off as the deerflies do towards the end of august” - saul bellow to philip roth, after people magazine printed a quote that looked a lot like an insult.  (the quote’s from the new yorker, the photo is 1948 life)

“please accept my regrets and apologies, also my best wishes. i’m afraid there’s nothing we can do about the journalists; we can only hope that they will die off as the deerflies do towards the end of august” - saul bellow to philip roth, after people magazine printed a quote that looked a lot like an insult. 

(the quote’s from the new yorker, the photo is 1948 life)

Comments (View)
April 14
“i have no news except that herr gellert, the poet, has died at leipzig and since his death has written no more poetry.” - mozart, in a letter to his sister from milan on january 26th 1770 (from my lovely 85-cent copy of mozart’s letters.) (image)

“i have no news except that herr gellert, the poet, has died at leipzig and since his death has written no more poetry.” - mozart, in a letter to his sister from milan on january 26th 1770 (from my lovely 85-cent copy of mozart’s letters.) (image)

Comments (View)
March 2

#540: elvis costello - watching the detectives and you belong to me (1979)

i’m awfully excited about my cover story in tomorrow’s observer about the sad limbo that private equity prince steven rattner has been suffering through lately. while i was writing the article, i couldn’t help but think about the incredibly slight physical resemblance between mr. rattner and elvis costello & the attractions’ bassist bruce thomas. frankly, that would get me thinking about lots of costello-related topics, especially, as it happens, the time he started an all-lady new wave dance party on stage by telling the crowd, “now, we think there’s rather too many tall people in the audience, so the young ladies in the audience can’t see all that well. and what we want all those guys to do is move away from the front here, so all the girls can come down front.” actually, now that i think about it, the bassist and investor don’t really look alike. but who’s really counting.

Comments (View)
November 9
“right now i believe everything will be alright if we all get our minds together. we’ve got to think about exactly what’s about to happen.” - lightnin’ hopkins (1964)

“right now i believe everything will be alright if we all get our minds together. we’ve got to think about exactly what’s about to happen.” - lightnin’ hopkins (1964)

Comments (View)
September 16
“just remember different people have peculiar tastes/ and the glory of love, the glory of love, the glory of love might see you through.” - lou reed

“just remember different people have peculiar tastes/ and the glory of love, the glory of love, the glory of love might see you through.” - lou reed

Comments (View)
August 3
“my mother used to tell me about vibrations. i really didn’t understand too much what that meant when i was a boy. it scared me, the word vibrations. to think that invisible feelings, invisible vibrations existed, scared me to death.” - brian wilson

“my mother used to tell me about vibrations. i really didn’t understand too much what that meant when i was a boy. it scared me, the word vibrations. to think that invisible feelings, invisible vibrations existed, scared me to death.” - brian wilson

Comments (View)
June 24

#398: big daddy kane - smooth operator (1989)

instead of apologizing for his long and beautiful affair with “a dear, dear friend from argentina,” governor mark sanford should have just been like, “girlfriend, you’ve been scooped like ice cream, so just swing or fling a gathering, try to cling, because it’s a big daddy thing. and i’m loving them, right, word is bond, so just play marvin gaye and let’s get it on… when it comes to this there’s none greater! sincerely yours, the smooth operator.”

on the other hand he does get points for actually saying, and i transcribed this myself during the press conference, “i would never say, ‘yo, i’m completely right with my heart.’”

Comments (View)
February 13
“well, an inebriated good evening to you all. welcome to raphael’s silver cloud lounge. slip me a little crimson, jimson, give me the low down, brown, i want some scoop, betty boop, i’m on my way into town… i’m so god damn horny that the crack of dawn better be careful around me… i used to know a girl, yeah, and it was a hubba hubba and ding ding ding, i said, ‘baby, you got everything.’ a week later it was a hubba hubba and ding ding dong, baby it sure didn’t last too long. i know things are tough all over, ain’t getting any better… i’ve been playing night clubs and staying out all night long, come home late, gone for three months, come back and everything in the refrigerator turns into a science project. so you get designs on a waitress you know. she got three or four kids, she’s sorting out her checks and she’s counting out her change. you say, ‘hey baby, heat me up a bearclaw on the radar range.’ well, and then it gets real cold.” - tom waits, nighthawks at the diner opening introduction, 1975.

“well, an inebriated good evening to you all. welcome to raphael’s silver cloud lounge. slip me a little crimson, jimson, give me the low down, brown, i want some scoop, betty boop, i’m on my way into town… i’m so god damn horny that the crack of dawn better be careful around me… i used to know a girl, yeah, and it was a hubba hubba and ding ding ding, i said, ‘baby, you got everything.’ a week later it was a hubba hubba and ding ding dong, baby it sure didn’t last too long. i know things are tough all over, ain’t getting any better… i’ve been playing night clubs and staying out all night long, come home late, gone for three months, come back and everything in the refrigerator turns into a science project. so you get designs on a waitress you know. she got three or four kids, she’s sorting out her checks and she’s counting out her change. you say, ‘hey baby, heat me up a bearclaw on the radar range.’ well, and then it gets real cold.” - tom waits, nighthawks at the diner opening introduction, 1975.

Comments (View)
January 5
“i heard of a man who says words so beautifully that if he only speaks their name women give themselves to him.” (from let us compare mythologies)

“i heard of a man who says words so beautifully that if he only speaks their name women give themselves to him.” (from let us compare mythologies)

Comments (View)
+
“my reputation as a ladies’ man was a joke. it caused me to laugh bitterly through the ten thousand nights i spent alone. from a third-story window above the parc du portugal i’ve watched the snow come down all day. as usual there’s no one here.” (from book of longing)

“my reputation as a ladies’ man was a joke. it caused me to laugh bitterly through the ten thousand nights i spent alone. from a third-story window above the parc du portugal i’ve watched the snow come down all day. as usual there’s no one here.” (from book of longing)

Comments (View)
November 14
did you know lil’ wayne’s dedication 3 is streaming for free on dj drama’s website? if you haven’t heard, lil’ wayne is like the beatles, just with more sex and less love: on d3 he says, “your girlfriend is into them gangsters/ and me being a gangster, i get into your girlfriend/  i stay still when the world spins,” which is only half as good as the mind-boggling profanity of, “your girl blessed me/ she sucked my dick/ and i sneezed.”

did you know lil’ wayne’s dedication 3 is streaming for free on dj drama’s website?

if you haven’t heard, lil’ wayne is like the beatles, just with more sex and less love: on d3 he says, “your girlfriend is into them gangsters/ and me being a gangster, i get into your girlfriend/  i stay still when the world spins,” which is only half as good as the mind-boggling profanity of, “your girl blessed me/ she sucked my dick/ and i sneezed.”

Comments (View)