The News From Ohio

Jonathan Chait, the New Republic's most prominent liberal blogger, has an occasional series of posts about absurd doings in Ohio, usually pulled from local newspapers' annals of crime. I think Chait sarcastically highlights the state out of his disbelief that a place that behaves like this could hold such an important role in the country's presidential elections and that places typically valued for their conservative, Midwestern wholesomeness are far loopier than the liberal Northeast. Then again, writing about a man who calls in a crime that began when he was masturbating at home is a softball that any blogger could hit.

Whenever I'm in Ohio, reading the Columbus Dispatch, which I respect as a high-quality metro daily, I'm struck by how different the serious items are in content from those in the Globe. The territory covered by Ohio's state politics is alarming. Last weekend, the news and editorial pages reported and analyzed State House bills that would effectively eliminate state workers' right to collective bargaining, allow people to bring guns into bars, and require people show ID at the polls so they can vote. All are proposed by Republicans who now control the state government's legislative and executive branches. (The first has passed but is the subject of a lawsuit, while the latter two are in committees.) The tone of letters to the editor is also somewhat aggressive, such as the one about how high school students should stop complaining about the work they have, which apparently was part of one recent article.

These matters are so different from what state legislators here take up that they're practically foreign policy for Massachusetts, though the House of Representatives this week approved a bill to limit public unions' say on their health care benefits. That these matters, particularly the latter two about guns and voting IDs, occupy such a center stage is also troubling, reflecting politicians' perennial concern with foolish matters whose effectiveness is beyond unproven. No sane person will feel more comfortable in bars because he can now bring a gun inside them or will start bringing one because he's now allowed. And no legitimate documentation exists of widespread voter fraud on a state or federal level in the past 10 years, unless you count Florida in the 2000 presidential election, which benefited conservatives quite handsomely and may qualify as unprincipled executive and judicial interference as opposed to voter interference. I'd like to think conservatives can be blamed for this habit, but I know it's also true of Democrats.

I wondered why legislators repeatedly focus on the frivolous when they repeatedly have profound matters confronting them -- say, a sluggish recovery from the worst recession of the past 75 years that is exacerbating the generation-long trend of damagingly vast income inequality. Then, while walking in downtown Columbus, I passed an office building with an electronic news scroll as a ridiculous headlined appeared. I forget the exact words, but in spirit it practically said, "Bill may allow aliens to marry." The topic was irrelevant and not worth legislating, but reporters love these stories because they're controversial and can always be couched in conditional verbs without acknowledging the minute chance they actually have of passing, and politicians love them because the news coverage raises their profile. And so the cycle perpetuates itself.

TV On The Radio Onstage

TV on the Radio's band name was always as appropriate as can be. The postmodernism implied by its mixture of media fit the band excellently because it has made its career by creating collages of genres and sounds. On the early records, David Andrew Sitek, one of the two founders and the band's producer, was credited with "music," not any specific instruments, which was apt because it wasn't apparent which instruments the band was actually playing then. He and Tunde Adebimpe, the other co-founder and lead singer, compressed, looped and warped their instruments so that they weren't recognizable, though they were still hypnotizing.

On stage at the House of Blues last Saturday, some of TV on the Radio's mystery dissipated when its five members stood onstage holding actual instruments. Even with their banks of keyboards, synthesizers and machines, you could almost figure out what they were up to. Then again, you couldn't quite figure it out: They began the show with a three-minute instrumental, with Sitek attaching chimes to his guitar's neck to create more sound. It slowly evolved into "Young Liars," the title track from the band's first EP. The mystery was not solved.

Through the rest of the night, they generally played any uptempo song of theirs, a relative term for most of TV on the Radio's oeuvre, much faster than it appears on record. "Staring at the Sun" and "Satellite," which closed the encore, were nearly punk rock songs. This was moderately disappointing because, again, the band's strength is its mystery and nuance in creating a style of music that no one else touches these days. Nuance tends to dissolve at such tempos. Then again, it was a concert -- people expect to be thrilled and rock songs certainly help the cause. TV on the Radio certainly had the crowd in its hands, particularly Adebimpe, who is quite a good dancer. The show was a bit simplistic (and brief, due to the House of Blues' house rules to clear the venue by 10 p.m. so it can become a nightclub) but despite this, no one does what TV on the Radio does, even after nine years as a band. They deserve a lot of credit for it, especially considering how popular they've become, and for making a capella somewhat cool.

Farewell to Gerard Smith, their bassist, who died of lung cancer this week. Above is the video for TV on the Radio's performance of "Wear You Out," from several years ago. The video's quality is surprisingly good.

Sauropod Eating Contest!

Rekindling my childhood fascination with dinosaurs, the American Museum of Natural History tomorrow opens an exhibit titled "The World's Largest Dinosaurs," focusing on the long-necked, big-trunked vegetarians that are, yes, very large. In his review of the exhibit, Edward Rothstein marvels at how the museum's scientists move past the dinosaurs' size to explore their biological systems. For example, how did sauropods 60 feet in length (and more) pump blood throughout their bodies? How did their circulatory and digestive systems work?

That latter question sure is a good one, especially when Rothstein presents some of the details about sauropods' diets. Apparently, African elephants must eat for 18 hours each day simply to keep functioning. "A sauropod, which could be 10 times the size of an elephant and might require 100,000 calories a day, would have had to devour more and, we read, 'get as much down their throats as possible, as fast as they could.' " Sauropods ate 1,150 pounds of food per day and didn't chew it because that would waste too much time! (Their digestive system may have fermented the food for slow digestion over two weeks.) And newly hatched sauropods might have doubled their weight in five days and quadrupled it in 12 days so they could reach the 90-ton size of an adult. Their weight might have increased as an adolescent by 3,500 pounds per year. As my fiancee said, talk about your "Freshman Fifteen."

Rothstein relays that sauropods' bodies developed to adapt to their size: Their long necks made more food available for eating and lessened the load on the rest of their bodies. But wouldn't you think that a size this large would be biologically disadvantageous, in the Darwinian sense, because they'd have to eat nearly every waking second simply to remain alive? When would they have time for anything else, namely protecting themselves from predators and sex? How did these guys hang around for 140 million years?! Perhaps it was fun because they could eat all they wanted, whenever they wanted, without the fear of getting fat. But it also sounds relatively boring to me -- so little time to shoot hoops, read a book in the sun or go for a swim in the lagoon.

Your Superstar Is My Botched Trade

Not only are the Knicks going to lose to their first-round opponent in this year's playoffs -- the Celtics -- but they'd lose to any of the eight Eastern Conference teams in the first round, including the Philadelphia 76ers and the Indiana Pacers, who are the two seeded lower than them. This is all one needs to know to evaluate the ceaselessly hyped, midseason trade for All-Star forward Carmelo Anthony. Sure, the Knicks have returned to the playoffs for the first time in seven years, but they did so at the expense of locking themselves into slightly above average seasons of between 43 and 49 wins for the next five years.

Anthony, who was to be a free agent before the trade, had long ago strongly implied he would sign with the Knicks in the summer, which would've required that they jettison one of their top-five players. Instead, the Knicks decided to trade four of their best five players for Anthony. They have no starting center, an aging point guard, and a bench that's a remarkably strange amalgamation of players who, aside from one or two of them, wouldn't play such a significant role on any other playoff team. Meanwhile, the Denver Nuggets, Anthony's old team, have been on fire since trading him, mainly because the players the Knicks sent them have been so good (and they may also set the world record for the number of tattoos that any collection of 12 men could have).

The trade has smacked so obviously of one pushed for by the Knicks' megalomaniac owner, the heir to a local media conglomerate. Anthony is a star and a native New Yorker and he's boosted interest in the team, especially in the front-row seats. But his style makes no sense within the team. The coach likes to run up and down the court and run a motion offense, but Anthony likes to hold the ball in isolation plays. The team's other star, Amar'e Stoudemire (he of the rediscovered Jewish spirituality), likes to run the pick and roll, but Anthony doesn't. And Anthony usually requires 19 field goal attempts to score 24 points -- not a good ratio.

Before the trade, the Knicks weren't going to advance beyond the first round, but they were coalescing nicely around a star and a young supporting cast. Now, they're old, aren't going to advance beyond the first round, and have already reached their ceiling. And they would've signed Anthony anyway after the season finishes without sacrificing that core. Huh? Celtics in five.

Have You Heard Of This Place Called Trader Joe's?

I realize I'm somewhere between five and 10 years late in writing this, but: I love Trader Joe's. Have you heard of it? You should definitely check it out. It's essentially noshing heaven, with rows of great snack food. I've yet to make it to anything more substantial -- pasta, meat, cheese, produce or frozen dinners -- but why bother when there are these snacks on hand? I could probably spend the next two years working my way through all of the options. In fact, I've been stuck on the dark chocolate peanut butter cups for the past three months.

It's baffling why they don't open a store in a more central location in Cambridge. The two stores are now on Memorial Drive and Fresh Pond Parkway, only accessible by car (or bike). If Trader Joe's took one of the empty storefronts in Central Square, they'd do knockout business. The line would be out the door.

Check the place out and thank me later.

LCD Soundystem, I Love You, But You're Bringing Me Down

LCD Soundystem's death, which came last week with a string of sold-out shows at Terminal 5 and Madison Square Garden, received much more attention than the band did during its life. Sure, the ticket scandal that accompanied the MSG show attracted attention. But I suspect real reason was James Murphy, the band's creator and leader, actually did what music critics wish every band did: LCD Soundsystem quit while it was ahead. No world tour behind their 11th record, released with every member in his or her mid-50s. No promise of a comeback record after three subpar ones. Not even accreted bitter resentment that compelled everyone to split while still at their height. Only a happy retirement, with three loved records and an impeccable reputation for embracing and skewering cultural elitism as no one else can.

As wonderful as LCD Soundystem's albums are, Murphy never really wrote great albums. He wrote great songs that, after a few years of singles, were packaged into albums. Each song was so long, at about seven minutes each, that the albums don't build momentum as a full work. By the time you've reached the end, it's hard to remember where you started 65 minutes and nine songs ago. But this didn't matter because each song's structure served as its own album. Murphy is a master of dynamics, aural and emotional. His songs ride crescendos and decrescendos like very few others can, building layers of intricately locked parts and taking them apart. The best, such as "All My Friends," which may be the best song ever, can do nothing but explode into epiphanies. Murphy is a man who can turn a song where the only lyric is "Yeah!" into brilliance.

Jon Caramanica's review of LCD Soundystem's and the Strokes' shows at MSG last weekend wistfully recalled 2001-2002, when New York was at the top of world's musical scene and Manhattan was in the midst of its last gap as an exciting center of culture. The bands perhaps borrowed too liberally from their influences, but then, everyone who writes a song does that, and they did it very well. Manhattan doesn't feel alive with energy like this anymore. Brooklyn probably does, but I haven't been there in a long time and don't know.

Unlike Murphy, the Strokes had to use their show as a comeback one because they nearly cracked during the past five years. Perhaps this shows that Murphy knew what he was doing when building LCD Soundsystem. Rather than ride a fierce hype wave with the Strokes, he mainly spent the first three years producing other bands' records, running his label, DFA, DJing and releasing his own singles. Then his first three albums built and built in their success to the point of relative stardom and now he's bowed out. The development of his career actually sounds like that of an LCD Soundsystem song.

Anyway, to the good times: Above is a video for "All My Friends," which is a song about trying to keep your friends while growing old. I haven't been able to stop singing it for the past week.