album of the day: all the songs on my iPod, in alphabetical orderPart 12 of ??

1. Long December - Counting Crows. Studio version. The live versions from either the VH1 show or the MTV show (we've got a double CD incorporating both of those) are vastly superior. I've never seen Counting Crows in concert, but I imagine they'd be tremendous.

2. Lord Granville - Al Stewart. Nobody sees Al Stewart in concert, of course, and Lord Granville, among all the songs on The Year of the Cat, is one I imagine lease likely to play well live.

3. Los Angeles - X. My Duquesne pal Dave "Dave" Koukal turned me on to X. The first album of theirs I bought was Los Angeles, which contains the song "Los Angeles," and I've never really been sure what I think of the album or the song. The re-released CD had a demo track of "Adult Books," and that's really what got me into X.

4. Los Angeles, I'm Yours - The Decemberists. Okay, I'm sold. As iPods are notorious for doing, mine repeats this song inordinately frequently when set to "randomly" "shuffle" songs. This morning I gave in. You win, Decemberists.

5. Loser - Beck. Get crazy with the cheez whiz all you want, Beck. You're still a loser.

6. Love - The Sundays.

7. Love Always Remains - MGMT. This is one of their more poppy tracks, which I don't think I mean as a pun.

8. Love The One You're With - Crosby, Stills, and Nash. My pal Bobo the Wandering Pall-bearer once started yelling about Israel and Palestine when this came on the radio in the car. It's not really about religious, cultural, and political conflict.

9. Love, Reign O'er Me - The Who. I'm a total sucker for this song, and it's not just Townshend's descending electric guitar line, but also Roger Daltrey's absolute pummeling of the vocal. Just soak in the genius.

10. Madame George - Van Morrison.

11. Magic Bus - The Who. It's almost hard to believe the same guy wrote this. But also genius.

12. Maginot Waltz - Ralph McTell. A cute little ditty about the singer and his pal Albert hanging around playing music and the singer trying to cozy up to Albert's cousin Marjorie, with a very cool chord progression, until it turns all off-to-war in the surprise finish:

Nine o'clock come round we had to take the charabanc
Albert was too drunk to play the banjo but still we sang
All except Marjorie, I could tell at a glance
Because me and Albert was leaving for France.

I said "We'll both be home in a week or two
Me and Albert and Lord Kitchener will teach the Hun a thing or two.
I'm sure to return, after me do not yearn
And we will waltz together all our lives through."

Did they? Well, certainly not in two weeks.