Mixed Media

Billboard is reporting that some acts have confirmed for Al Gore's "Live Earth" concerts on July 7th, and while the concept is admirable, please don't make me attend. The show at Giants Stadium in New Jersey will feature the progressive sounds of Dave Matthews, Roger Waters, The Police, Akon, Alicia Keys, Bon Jovi, Fall Out Boy, John Mayer, KT Tunstall, and Melissa Etheridge. Holy Gap khakis, that almost reads like a parody. What about, you know, Starship? The London lineup is only slightly better, with Madonna, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Beastie Boys and Foo Fighters, all of whom put on adequate live shows even if their best material is years behind them, but get a load of (shudder) Genesis, and the worst of the interchangeable syrupy Brit-"rockers": James Blunt, David Gray, Damien Rice, and Keane. Blarf! Seeing Bloc Party on this bill actually makes me like them less. Well, maybe the shows in Shanghai or Rio will be better. If you're interested in jumping through all the random hoops to get tickets to this thing (Register! Apply! Wait! Get notified! Provide blood sample!) then feel free to go here to find out more, and let me know how that goes for you. Meanwhile I'll be trying to help save the earth by carpooling to Coachella -- coming up in just over two weeks.

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Last night's "Lost" left main gals Kate (brunette) and Juliet (blond) handcuffed together and running through the wilds a la "Charlie's Angels." As the two made their way through the brush, it struck me that their names are both found in Shakespearean works: Kate as the prickly one in "The Taming of the Shrew," and Juliet as the star-crossed lover in "Romeo and Juliet." In traditional Shakespearean fashion, both gals have picked the same man as their ill-fated lover.

As cliché as it is for two women to catfight over a man, I thought the episode was interesting. Kate's tortured relationship with her own mother, and Juliet's work at making women into mothers (she's a fertility doctor) brought an interesting psychological element to the episode. Kate yearned to be supported by her estranged mother, but by killing her mother's husband, she condemned the relationship to failure. Juliet, on the other hand, only wanted to help her sister get pregnant, and was then recruited to work on a fecund, jungle island where no one has any trouble getting pregnant.

It's worth noting that there has been very little female bonding on this male-written show. Although men bro down like there's no tomorrow--trekking into the woods, killing boars, hiding guns--the women are seemingly not very interested in interacting with one another, save when they need to take a pregnancy test. In fact, I can't think of a single episode that's focused on a female-female relationship in the show's three year history.

Ultimately, I don't know if the episode furthered any plot arcs, except for the fact that The Others are now seemingly gone except for Juliet. Quite a few bloggers have suggested that (like Shakespeare's Juliet at the masked ball) Juliet is a decoy, a mechanism for getting inside the Losties once and for all. If she does, I hope she takes the time to make friends with some of the women, because I'm tired of men being the only ones with female friends on the show.

Okay, back to reality, where we have our own ongoing mayhem and tragedies to deal with.

—Jen Phillips

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A new book claims women have weaker sex drives than men because of testosterone.
Yeah right. First of all, women have testosterone too. Secondly, testosterone is made out of cholesterol, which is just about the least sexy molecule I can think of.

To be honest, I didn't read the book but I did read the book review by Sandra Tsing Loh. It holds some truth. Maybe it would help my friend, a 110-pound waif, have some compassion for her libido, which she compares to the libidos of those beefcakes who spend a few hours a day pumping iron at Gold's. Just because she's not on the prowl constantly doesn't mean she's repressed. Her sex drive isn't "weaker" but "calmer," "less demanding," and "less needy." She shouldn't pathologize it. True enough, Loh.

On the other hand, I've been mulling over Loh's anecdote about two obese L.A. lesbians who haven't had sex since the Clinton impeachment. When I first read about "Teri and Pat" a month ago—suspiciously mentioned by first name only—something just didn't seem right. In lieu of sex, "Teri and Pat have had a special Monday-night ritual. They order an extra-large cheese pizza… settle in on the couch with large twin bags of Doritos. Each chip is dipped first in cream cheese and then in salsa. Cream cheese, salsa. Cream cheese, salsa.... The Doritos are finished to the last crumb, and then, upon arrival, the pizza as well."

Here's what tipped me off: Doritos dipped in cream cheese. Ever seen that? No, because it doesn't happen. You can dip a Dorito in sour cream, baked brie, even Easy Cheese. But cream cheese is so firm that the Dorito in hand just crumbles. And so does this anecdote, despite Loh's deft prose. Nobody dips Doritos in cream cheese—not lesbians, not gays, not straights, nobody. Maybe "lesbian bed death" exists, but this Monday night, double-dipping, binge routine does not. "Teri and Pat" are no more than a caricature striking terror in the hearts of women everywhere.

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Well, ask and ye shall receive. I was just complaining about the low quality of 128kbps iTunes mp3s, and blammo: today EMI announced it will be offering its catalog on iTunes in 256kbps quality for the slightly increased price of $1.29 per song. The big news is that the tracks will also be free of the crippling DRM (Digital Rights Management) protection that many have complained about, but of course the other news is that a record label has finally broken the 99-cent barrier on iTunes, something they've lobbied for unsuccessfully for a while. Hopefully this won't lead to more label influence over prices ("hey, that Beyonce track looks hot, up the price to $3.50 for the next 7 hours!") but if they're willing to make this kind of tradeoff, I'm willing to pay 30 cents.

Somebody does need to tell the Times that Damon Albarn is now two bands removed from Blur, though.

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