my baby's got the bends, we don't have any real friends

- radiohead, the bends

two of my regular morning companions are anjanette and vito. they're not from the office, nor are they my pet dogs (and i'm not looking for any in the near future, thank you). they're only the voice of non-reason in my head, especially when my earphones are plugged in and my mp3 player is in radio mode. welcome to my daily habit, the one i don't want to quit.

in the four years or so that the morning brew has been on air, i'd probably been listening for almost the same length of time. except for the time that they changed the station format and got eric to come on board temporarily... i guess it just proves that the jocks were the essence of the show. i'm rambling, i know. i've said all of this before, here. so anyway, vito came back and anjanette took over the news reporting duties. soon they got the show back on track, especially with the return of a much-loved segment, the morning brew playlist. and after almost two years, they brought back another popular segment, the morning brew cd archive. a segment i had been on twice in mylinda's time. and just this week, i renewed my acquaintance with vito when i came on board for the third time.

it's pretty obvious, i like my 15 minutes of fame. if i can stretch it to half an hour, so much better. talking about one of my favorite things -- music -- is definitely a bonus. another plus is the chance to finally put on board one of my top 5 albums of all time, from one of my top 5 bands of all time: the sophomore-jinx jinxer, radiohead's the bends.

like i said on air that day, radiohead is more than just that rocker knockoff creep (a song i hated, by the way). and they're not just this way cool band that is so introspective it gets weird, like they are in ok computer and the three albums since (or what i've heard so far from them... i got bored too soon). critics have heaped praises and the brits all but stood them up next to the beatles, but i also wonder: what's the big deal? maybe this album is about the most i can handle from them. but this is where people started treating them seriously, instead of as "just another rock band". there is beauty in transition.

the great thing about this outing was, i think i did make an impact. i remember this regular texter who thought the band is overrated, with all that hoopla about karma police and the other stuff. after he heard the first song (i picked just, one of the less recognizable singles), he might have been tempted to give the band another chance. most of the other messages were about wanting to hear my iron lung, but i thought that the album deserved to be exposed beyond the hit singles. besides, i was not passing up the chance to let people hear my favorite radiohead song, black star. oh, and this dude actually thought the album was cool, and so was i. haha! i mean, come on, the whole point is of this exercise is to delude myself that i am cool. i the man!