Captain Beefheart has been taking up all of my time. It's just so perfect. You know the album, it's a split album, Clear Spot and Spotlight Kid? Just all the soul on it. He rips a lot of stuff from Motown, like "My Head Is My Only House Unless It Rains" and "Too Much Time." There's just a lot of funky old songs. It's also got that song "Her Eyes Are a Blue Million Miles" from the Big Lebowski soundtrack. And then there's the Safe as Milk and Mirror Man Sessions. It's just the fact that everything that's come out that's new is horseshit. It's just real. He didn't make it for any type of commercial success whatsoever. That's just him.

Some people might know E.G. Daily from her roles as Dottie in Pee Wee's Big Adventure, zipper-dressed Loryn in Valley Girl, or the voice of Tommy Pickles in Rugrats. But what gets overlooked are the ridiculously amazing records she recorded in the mid-'80s when she was one hit away from being bigger than Madonna. Her Jellybean Benitez-produced "Mind Over Matter," from the four-star Mark Harmon hit Summer School, is the definitive '80s teen movie montage-scene song. Equal parts Kenny Loggins, Echo & The Bunnymen, and "Invincible"-era Pat Benatar. Tense, emotionally taut, inspirationally anthemic, propulsively urgent—this song contains multitudes, it demands to be heard, and danced to, now!

I'm in definite love with my PS2 and its affiliated products. In my biased opinion it's a modern marvel, a multimedia device that is superior to all in wasting time, killing boredom and ruining or enhancing your social life. I can say with pride that the $400-plus of my college tuition reimbursement money spent fall semester of '00 was a wise investment. My PS2 has been there for me through four girlfriends, breakups, after-hours inebriated loneliness, countless TLA DVD rentals, an Eagles Super Bowl and good living. I have a 40 gig hard drive. So I can burn games I rent (yup!) and not have to buy them.

I love the work of Ars Nova Workshop, curated by Mark Christman, a smart, insightful and passionate curator. Mark has a fantastic sensibility and produces a world-class series of experimental jazz and new music, and as near as I can tell, by himself with very little money—low to the ground, risky, high quality—very impressive stuff. The Anthony Braxton concert he presented was one of the most interesting things I have seen in a while.