Just watched Derek’s segment on Discovery Channel’s Daily Planet about cracking copy-protected CDs. How often do you get to see one of your friends introduced on national television with the leader, “Is this man a criminal?”

The Velvet Underground box set is a nice piece of work – the remastering definitely yields a better sounding result than the original Verve-edition CDs I had. It’s particularly noticable on the last two albums. The fifth disc of really early demos are… um… of archival interest only. Not particularly listenable. A lot of the extra material on the other discs is great though.

Currently compiling my 2002 Best Of music list, it should be done tonight, maybe tomorrow.

np – The Velvet Underground / Peel Slowly And See – Loaded

Picked up my Velvet Underground box set from the post office. Nice package! The banana on the front of the box is peelable! The liner notes/book is pretty mighty as well. I think I’m going to have to gather together all the books from the box sets I own and put them on a shelf or something. I’ve no idea where most of them are.

The new Fountains Of Wayne is out in April.

np – Sigur Ros / ( )

So Johnny Marr’s new band The Healers are finally releasing their debut album Boomslang on Feb 3 and are touring – they’re at Lee’s on Jan 26, a show with a hefty $25 pre-service charge price tag.

I think it’s sort of inevitable that I approach this release with some trepidation. While one of my all-time guitar heroes, Marr’s post-Smiths work has been spotty and the Healers stuff I have heard was underwhelming. I don’t know what I expect from Marr… obviously it’s unfair to want the second coming of the Smiths, but as I recall this stuff sounded pretty trad rock, Oasis-like.

I will definitely give the new stuff a listen, won’t say I’ll rush out and buy it on the day of release or anything, but I will give it a shot. I was listening to the last Electronic album this weekend… again, I probably have unrealistic expectationst but I would have liked to think that Bernard Sumner and Johnny Marr could come up with something less patchy than they did.

I probably hold my heroes to too high a standard.

As for the show, I don’t know if I’ll be going – it’ll probably be a bunch of middle-aged mooks shouting out requests for Smiths stuff, anyway. And that I do not need.

np – Galaxie 500 / This Is Our Music

What a night. 11 hours and my computer isn’t completely defragged. I stop it at around 80% cause I’ve got work to do and it’s only my storage drive – my programs drive is fully defragged and that’s what really matters. So after I give it an ol’ reboot, I kick up Cold Fusion Studio so I can go get some freelance stuff I’ve been procrastinating on done. Well guess what no longer works? I get as far as the title screen and then the thing just hangs. Okay, reboot again. Same result. This sucks – short term, I need to get this work done NOW and long term, I need this software! I no longer have the install files anywhere, so it’s time to go digging in the great online software black market (aka Kazaa for a new copy. Long story short (too late!) it takes me five hours to get a working copy downloaded and installed. During this time, I manage to install and uninstall about three different versions (didn’t work either) and set up a server on my computer (unwittingly). Finally, I get a copy of Homesite 5.0 to run. Geez Louise. First my headphones and then this…

On top of that, for some reason the postman couldn’t/wouldn’t deliver my packages from Columbia House today, and even though there’s no duty on the packages and no earthly reason he couldn’t just leave them at the security desk, my CDs are now sitting at a post office that has the exact same working hours as I do. Meaning I will have to either head up to Bloor and Avenue on lunch hour or take off early from work. I could just wait till Saturday but I want to make sure the billing is correct, and sooner is better than later. Sonofabitch.

My new headphones are nice, though.

I will be going to sleep early tonight.

np – Ryan Adams / Heartbreaker

Well this is disappointing. My headphones have just decided to kack out – I now get the left channel out of both sides of the headphone. Not much use if I’m listening to anything recorded after 1965 or so. Looks like I’ll be making an unscheduled stop off in the electronics stores on Yonge St on my way home.

Speaking of my British guitar heroes, I posted a message on Bernard Butler’s message board asking if the release of a ‘Falling’ single meant that a domestic release of the McAlmont & Butler album Bring It Back was far behind? Well Bernard said it is, apologized for my having to pay import prices (I will actually head to ebay, but whatever) and told me to rip EMI a new one for only releasing the single domestically. Nimrods. But still, it’s nice to establish some sort of dialogue with one of my favorite guitarists of the last 10 years. He also asked if I knew the Hidden Cameras – I don’t personally, but the guys in my band do… Five Seventeen is roommates with one of the Cameras and did some mastering work on their indie releases. How cool is that?

np – Superdrag / Last Call For Vitriol