Recently, Keith Murray, from We Are Scientists [if you don't know this band you should sincerely check them out], chatted with me for a bit while waiting in a long European buffet line about his band’s emerging presence and much more.

E: You’re in the middle of a really big tour right now. Do you think that touring plays a bigger role these days in being a band than when you started the band?

K: Um, I mean, I think perhaps, proportionally, no. I don’t think anything’s really changed about touring for us and I’m not sure that the fruits of the touring labor are necessarily more substantive. It does seem like the selling of records has become definitionally less…of a factor in measuring how well you’re doing. I feel like touring is probably about as important as it ever was and the space that…the big gaping chasm that’s been left by diminishing album sales has sorta filtered itself into other things. Like, I feel like, weirdly, licensing now is playing a much bigger role than it used to. And online presence, in general, is sorta replacing sales. I feel like touring is a rock that is not changing.

E: Speaking of online presences, I’m interested in knowing what you think about Myspace since it started getting big in the middle of your career with We Are Scientists.

K: I feel like…and I’m sure there are examples that can contradict what I’m about to say…but in my experience, Myspace seems…..sort of like the free release thing that Radiohead did with In Rainbows…it works really well once people know what they’re looking for. But I’ve never experienced a situation where I was trolling around Myspace and discovered a band. That seems like a reach for me. Read More »

Bye, Bye, Bye Lou Pearlman!

Oh, to be John Mayer’s camera.

I really think teenagers are getting dumber by the minute–er, MySpace

Ali Lohan: 14 going on 40

It’s summertime: learn how to apply bronzer

I take back all earlier judgement: I kind of dig Natalie Portman and her boo

Libertarian Ocean Colonies are totally the new Facebook

Heidi and Spencer’s PDA and gender-stereotyping outfits

Don’t forget to call Grandma–it’s Sinatra Day!

Beyonce is too famous for church or modesty

Let’s just cut to it – sixteen people are left in that bed.

Their challenge for the day is a biathlon and with that, I am over the whole Tila’s bi thing and it’s only episode three. Tila looks bored as she announces that it’s boys versus girls. What do pearl necklaces and blue balls have to do with biathlons? Oh.

This challenge makes me wonder why I never had a slip n slide when I was a kid. “I cruised through it until I got to the blue balls; then it all fell apart for me…that was my downfall, the blue balls.” Isn’t that how it always happens, Ryan?

Do they all share a wet suit? Chad is last and he too struggles with blue balls. Why do they call Jersey Lisa/Toni from Paradise Hotel lookalike Rizzo? I like her. I might like-her like her. Oh, and she wins it for the girls. Aw, Chad, I heart you even though you lost.

The girls win a date. Which consists of the girls – going to school. They are dressed in terrible school girl uniforms and Tila’s going to teach them – what? How to make a Myspace page? Read More »

Maybe it was Hot Topic’s fault. Or better yet, maybe it was TV’s fault. Either way, something turned a huge part of our heterosexual male population GAY over the last five years or so…and they all turned gay without even being homosexual. It’s a tragedy, really, and these way too femme boys who supposedly still like girls have even made my own love life tragically hellish.

Katy Perry’s hit single “Ur So Gay” couldn’t have come at a better time. Well, wait… I’d actually say it’s a bit overdue. I could have really used it to get myself through my last break up with a boy who told me that he had shaved his arms so that they’d ‘feel nice’ for me…

ANYWAY, It didn’t take me long to become a fan of this girl. Does Madonna love her? Sure she does. Does Myspace love her? Duh. But that’s not why I like her. I like her because she’s openly quirky. She’s intelligent AND fun and YES, that combination certainly does exist in female society and I’m proud to finally be able to add yet another awesome artist to the soundtrack of my life. Read More »

We have a problem. I have fallen again for someone…by Internet.

No, no, not Match.com or anything like that. I didn’t surf eHarmony and develop some delusional love affair with someone’s profile picture. It’s a little more complicated than that.

I’ve always hated dating. The whole process stresses me out. The questions that make you feel like you’re at a job interview, (which technically you are, ‘pick me, hire me!‘) the awkward hand holding, the TIME. All of it, to me, is just a means to an end. An end where you’re finally comfortable and can stop wearing make-up around them, stay in for the night to watch bad reality television, or cuddle under your Disney blanket, knowing they don’t care — they just want to be with you. I love love, but I don’t love the process of getting there. I just want it to happen and what better way to get there, than by the Internet? Read More »

I was at a bar last night, politely making conversation with a group of guys. They were nice and I was bored. Our drunken conversation soon went from the ‘awesome’ weather to a subject even less interesting: me and my singlehood. I like being single. I’d like to stay this way. Yet, somehow, this is always devastating news to everyone from my family and friends to strangers at a bar.

“Where’s your boyfriend?”

The response, “I don’t have one”, must be code for “I have SARS” based on the jaw dropping and disgusted looks that shoot back at me invariably.

So the guys at the bar were appalled. And probably simultaneously delighted because NOW, now they had a license to set me up with their ‘young’ friend…the one closer to my age…the one blushing because he is RIGHT THERE…the one I don’t even find remotely attractive.

And alas, I was yet again playing a game I have played far too many times to count.: The “Gracefully Decline Without Hurting Feelings” Game. I know, I know. I should just always be a bitch. To be honest, often times, I am. However, it’s harder to do this when I have been having a genuinely good conversation with the guy. Or when it’s my best friend who really believes in her gut that the new guy in her office is my soulmate.

The line that got me out of bad emotional karma last night was this one: Read More »

I did not watch season one and I was very proud of myself until I decided that I needed to fill the void that ROL and Bret were leaving in my heart and TV time.

Oh, Tila, maybe this time it will work for you.

So Tila is newly single and 15 guys and 15 girls arrive to compete for the affections of the MySpace ho. Tila comes out in gold booty shorts saying that it didn’t work out with Bobby and that she’s still bi. And by bi, she means a liar.

She wastes no time and starts with a boys vs. girls cage dance off in order to win Tila time. She encourages them to remove clothing and of course a girl removes her top and Nick, the elder care specialist, drops his drawers. I’m not amused by the shot glasses blocking out body parts; it’s not clever.

The girls win and do they recycle MTV houses? I only saw one episode, but it looks like they covered Domenico’s faux marble with blue and pink carpets.

I like that we know everyone’s occupations. Will they keep their jobs after this? There are way too many people from New York and New Jersey on this show. Read More »

You know, I can understand being an angst ridden teenager. I can also understand being angry with someone who might have been provoking me on a social networking site-like Myspace. On top of that, I can understand being jealous of all of the totally rad videos on YouTube that get tons of plays and I can relate to the desire to create something that becomes incredibly popular.

BUT, beating the sh*t out of a cheerleader in your class who MIGHT have been (nothing has been proven) provoking you on Myspace is NOT COOL.

Eight teenage girls in Florida recently did something so disgusting that even angry outcasts would have cringe. They lured Victoria Lindsey, a pretty cheerleader, back to one of their homes. They had a video camera set up and then they proceeded to beat her for 35 minutes. They beat her so terribly that she was knocked unconscious and then dragged off into a car. Once in the car, she was driven to a second location and told that if she ran to the police… she would receive an even worse beating. Read More »

To some, pickup lines are irritating, to others, they’re a welcome invitation, and to still others, they can even be insulting. Personally, while there is a slim likelihood of taking a guy seriously after he throws out a clichéd line, I do enjoy a good laugh from those that are unique.

Enter last weekend. While out on the town blissfully throwing back a few vodka sodas with my best wing-women, I was approached by what I could only assume was a potential suitor. The prospect excited me. Standing there all suave with his head cocked to one side, he said “Girl, you are solid steel and sex appeal.”

I laughed so hard I nearly spilled my drink (thank god for my cat-like reflexes, to waste my drink would have been a tragedy). While I appreciate notice to my “solid steel” physique and “sex appeal” (it is nice to know that my time at the gym and new bio-flex bra paid off) I laughed hysterically and he quickly fled the scene. Once fully able to compose myself, my gals and I commenced a reminiscent conversation of a few unusual pickup lines we have witnessed: Read More »

At this point, as I’m sitting here on my couch, nearing the end of day 4 without drinking, I am starting to really believe that I may not be an alcoholic. Granted, I am sitting here eyeing the beer that is in my roomie’s hand. My other roomie, who is on this mission with me, is undoubtedly eyeing it, too.

I spend most Sundays, and yes, even EASTER, entirely preoccupied with a predictable hang over. I lay around in my bed with multiple glasses of water. I check Myspace religiously and later feel accomplished when I gather the strength to order in food.

Today, clearly, was different. I woke up and started to get sh*t done! The trouble, however, even amidst my productivity, was the fact that today was Easter. Something about religious holidays, particularly those on which I typically participate in a family gathering of some sort, tend to make me want to drink. You see, I come from an Irish family. I hope that that says enough. Read More »