My Favorite Things 2010

Favorite Songs
Download, listen and enjoy a mix of some of Can You Dig It?'s favorite recorded music presented by Lambda Lambda Lambda's in-house DJ, Lamar Latrell.




2010 Favorites Side A by canyoudigit

Groove Me/Maximum Balloon
Dave Sitek from TV On the Radio teams up with Theophilus London and you're gonna have to wipe the funk off your face.

Got Nuffin/Spoon
An epic song from Spoon's really, really good album, Transference.

I Wanna Be Your Telephone/Jamie Lidell
Funky in his own right, Jamie Lidell channels Prince/Morris Day grooves from the golden Purple Era.

Everlasting Light/The Black Keys
I love falsetto rock.

Doin' It Again/The Roots
Black Thought kills it, once again: "Dear Diary/The fans still swear by me/Even though I'm late night now, like 'Here's Johnny'."

The World (Is Going Up in Flames)/Charles Bradley
62-year-old soulman brings the heat!

Flying Overseas/Theophilus London
It's usually a no-no to have two songs from one artist on the same side, but since the first one is officially Maximum Balloon and this one is officially the hotness, I made an exception. Also, go download all of Theophilus' mixtapes. They're all free and full of great music. I can't wait to hear the music he actually sells.

I Can Change/LCD Sound System
Straight up British retro dance pop.

Think It Over/Bilal
Any of the songs from Bilal's innovative album Airtight's Revenge could be here, but this one gets special placement because it's not every day that a love song references the assassination of Dr. King.

Forget/Twin Shadow
I can't help but love Twin Shadow.


2010 Favorites Side B by canyoudigit

Never Tear Us Apart/Beck's Record Club (Beck, St. Vincent, Liars)
While re-recording the entire Kick album, Beck and his friends make this INXS song beautiful again.

Glass Mountain Trust/Mark Ronson & The Business Intl featuring D'angelo
D'angelo makes a triumphant return on this wild Mark Ronson song.

Power/Kanye West
Need a pick-me-up on the way back to work from lunch? Let Kanye be your guide.
"Screams from the haters/gotta nice ring to it/I guess every superhero need his theme music."

Black Magic/José James
Great voice on a great track.

Flash Delirium/MGMT
The video really brings this song to life.

Games You Can Win/RJD2 featuring Kenna
Flawless, all the way around. Listen, repeat. Listen, repeat.

Simili Life/Quadron
Again, any song from Quadron could get on this list. This one does it for me every time.

Headphone Rock/Donwill, Von Pea, Che Grand
Three of my favorite MCs rock the mic over one of The Roots' Late Night with Jimmy Fallon "sandwich" songs.

Loving You Is Killing Me/Aloe Blacc
I'll wait while you pick the soul outcho teeth.

Jupiter and the Moon/Los Lobos
These guys just do no wrong in my book. David Hidalgo's voice dynamite.

Favorite Things 2010

Favorite LPs
No Glee compilations here, you've got to have artistic vision to make it on this list.



Gorillaz/Plastic Beach
Maybe the best Gorillaz album so far... and that's high praise.



John Legend & The Roots/Wake Up!
The Roots take some of the polish off of John Legend on this gritty album of covers.



Quadron
For the record, I bought this Danish album in late 2009, but it qualifies for this list because it didn't officially get released in the U.S. until 2010. That's good enough for me. Truly, this record is one of my all-time favorites. Perfect from start to finish.



Twin Shadow/Forget
New Wavey, emo soul that sometimes sounds like Morrissey, but I don't hold that against it.



Janelle Monae/The Archandroid
Spacey, cinematic soul that plays to the film studies nerd in me with references to Fritz Lang's Metropolis.



She & Him/Volume Two
Zooey Deschanel's voice makes me tingly like a schoolboy who needs a minute before walking up to the chalkboard. She and M. Ward make sweet rocking songs with references and influences that span decades of good popular music.



Spoon/Transference
Forward-thinking rock-n-roll.



Kanye West/My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy
Kanye harnesses his demons into an entertaining hip-hop masterpiece, complete with all the crazy, cringe-worthy moments you would expect. But in the end, it's all worth it.



Jamie Lidell/Compass
Not a one-trick pony, Jamie Lidell shows his command of a variety of musical stylings all anchored by his powerful voice.



Airtight's Revenge/Bilal
Record label and record leaking issues tried to eff-up the career of one of my favorite singers. Thankfully, the setbacks didn't stop Bilal from creating a genius work of inspired music -- no classification available or required.

Favorite Things 2010

Favorite Actor
I haven't seen Tron, and probably won't, but I'll be damned if Jeff Bridges isn't my favorite actor of 2010. He deservedly won the Oscar for Crazy Heart this year and was just as amazing performing the Cohen brothers' astounding Old West cowboy dialogue in True Grit. On a side note, True Grit is great mostly because of that dialogue and the actors who deliver it -- all of them, even Matt Damon. On a side, side note, I just saw The Informant, and really enjoyed Matt Damon in that, too. Still, it's Jeff Bridges for favorite actor in 2010.

Favorite Unintentional Insult
An old lady who kind of looked like Joan Rivers wins this one just under the deadline for a comment made today at Chick-fil-A.

As Sofia and I were finishing up our lunch, she stopped by our table and said, "Oh, I've been watching this little girl. She's so beautiful and well-behaved, and that's a rare gem these days. She's going to be Miss America someday. Are you related?"

Favorite Things 2010

Favorite Meal
I'm definitely a creature of habit. If I go to a restaurant and like what I order, I'll order that same thing on every return visit for years. Too many times I've tried to be adventurous and switch up my order, only to be disappointed.

Fortunately, that's not the case with our friend Chin's restaurant, Sweet Basil. Everything they serve is dynamite, and if I can bring myself to venture away from my current standing order, whatever I select becomes my new favorite. It started with the green curry, moved on to the mussamun curry, and then the pad see-u. But in 2010, the new best meal at Sweet Basil or anywhere else in the greater Greenville area is the curry/green beans/red and green pepper/lime leaf stir fry, pad prik-king. It's fun to say and it will blow your effing socks off.

Favorite Scheme to Get Fit
Somehow I was able to convince Santa Claus that the only way I was going to get fit in 2011 was if he brought me an Xbox Kinect in November. So, he did, and now I have a chart to log the future hours I will spend sweating without a controller in my living room.

Although a month-long sinus infection has me off to a slow start, I remain hopeful primarily because of the genius game that is Dance Central.

I used to get frustrated that Dance Dance Revolution severely limited my talent on the dance floor because it simply measured whether you could step on the right buttons in a pre-determined rhythm. But now, thanks to the technology of Kinect and Dance Central, I'm finally able to use all of the vast tools with which I've been blessed to totally smoke the competition and garner accolades from the game's choreographer/hype man: "You got this on lock!" he frequently cheers while I try to keep my husky jeans from falling off my ass.

Using the Kinect motion-sensor camera, the game tracks how accurately you follow the choreography -- from the hands to the feet to the hips. Each of the 32 songs has different moves, which you learn in "Break It Down" mode. Once you've run through the steps, you put them all together and perform the song.

It's fun even to do the queeny dances to the Lady Gaga, but what makes the game great is the awesome soundtrack selections. All of those hours spent in the early '90s dancing to Bell Biv DeVoe's "Poison" and Wreckx-n-Effect's "Rump Shaker" have finally paid off for me.

Another important feature for professional dudes like me is the freestyle breaks included in each song, where you get to break loose and shake it while the Kinect camera records video of you for everyone to admire, study and/or laugh at. I would share some of me droppin' it like it's hot, but I haven't figured out how to do it yet. Here's one of Ellen:

My Favorite Things 2010

It's one of the oldest tricks in the book: Create lists of "the best" or "the worst" this or that of the year and let the debate rage in the public square or the comments section. Rolling Stone has a long history of creating lists of the greatest somethings of all time, Huffington Post does it every day for the dumbest things, and during this time of year, it only gets worse with every blogger in the world releasing best of the year lists.

I'm not going to claim to have the depth of knowledge that would be required to form an educated opinion on the best/worst any thing (save maybe the Best Prince Songs Released in 2010), so I won't be doing that here. Instead, I'm stealing a page from Oprah's book (club) and just announcing my favorite things of the year. There can be no external debate. These are just my own very personal favorites.

So, let's get this rocking:

Favorite Loaf of Bread
Got-dang! The Pillsbury people are geniuses. Maybe "How It's Made" has already done this episode, but I would love to see how they get their delicious dough in those cardboard tubes.

Regardless, from the cinnamon rolls to the crescent rolls, I've been a big fan of the Pillsbury folks for many, many years. My admiration was only further cemented when Carolina brought home their Crusty French Loaf. Just pop open the cardboard tube, bake for 25 minutes, and you have a simple, hot, delicious crusty bread. It's magical.

Eat it. You'll love it.

Favorite Technological Innovation
Hooking up the internet directly to the TV and being able to instantly stream Netflix titles has saved my whole family from the dangers of crap television and, thanks to the Netflix Instant Queue Challenge, prevented this blog from drying up without new content.

Netflix now offers a streaming-only package for $8 a month that includes lots of great TV shows and films and absolutely no Snooki.

Elizabeth Edwards

A lot people in this world are dealt a pretty crappy hand, but Elizabeth Edwards had to have one of the shittiest ever: Her eldest son died in a car accident, she got cancer, her husband cheated on her and fathered a child with a sleaze-ho while she had cancer, and then everybody found out about it.

Sad, but she seemed to handle it the best anyone could. She didn't run out to get a reality show.

Unfortunately, her death gives me another reason to revisit my John Edwards campaign stop photos from the '04 Democratic primaries. I was all proud of them (check out John's glistening wedding ring). The one above is not a great one, especially of Elizabeth, but I guess she survived worse tragedies.

Netflix Challenge: Romance and stuff

We're over the half-way hump on our quest to whittle the Netflix Instant queue down to zero, so it should be smooth sailing from here.

David and Layla
Another indie culture-clash (American Jews vs. Iraqi immigrants) romance film, but without all the stuff that would make it enjoyable. It received decent reviews, and Carolina liked it, but I thought the lead actor was a little over-the-top and the writing not so hot. The only enjoyment for me was seeing a street and some shops very near where I once stayed in Brooklyn. Besides that? Blah.




Jerry Maguire
This is almost a better football movie than it is a romance -- and that's a compliment. It's one of the Cameron Crowe movies that's Cameron-Crowey in a good way. People will watch this one in 40-50 years on the future version of Turner Classic Movies and get nostalgic for the 1990s.

But don't believe me. Listen to my hero, Harold Ramis:




The Headless Woman
Arthouse Argentinian movie about a woman who hits something with her car, then gradually begins to think she killed someone. There's an interesting subtext here about class and race in Argentina, but I haven't quite figured it out yet. Maybe you should give it a shot.




Just 37 to go.