Brody Dalle Diploid Love

I've not always been a fan of Brody. I thought the Distillers sucked, just flat out sucked. Spinnerette had some moments, but this is probably her finest hour. That it suffers from some caveats probably speaks to some reasons why I'll never fly the flag for her, but still, this is a good album. I just wish it was better.
See, she sounds too much like Courtney Love, which evokes a deep primal hatred in me. Seriously,I no joke hate Courtney, or Michelle, or whatever fake ass name she goes by as a stand in for her phony life. Yeah, I loathe her, so I hear a vocal simularity, and my hackles go up. I hear a riff copped from her, and I skip to the next song. This is Brody at her least Courtney-ish.
She has discovered what I'll call the ZZ Top lesson: when your rocknroll muse is dying, you can hook it up to a couple of synths for life support, just like ZZ Top did on "Eliminator". It's too bad that she had to drag the drums into that, though. But, that was Bob Mould's mistake, as well ( the reason why people had a hard time with some of his more electronic compositions was partially due to a pretty bad drum sound.) so I'm not writing her off.
So, with some caveats out there, let's talk about what I really like:
Track two- Underworld is a nice piece of New Wave post punk, that starts with a nice little snarling riff, but slowly gets taken over by mariachi horns- it sounds like Rocket From the Crypt meets the Bronx, so yes, I like that. . Track Three - Don't Mess With Me is nice little rock tune, with some Joan Jett as Gary Glitter glam swagger, that gets a giant QOTSA-ish chorus. Hard to argue with that, eh?
Track Six- Meet the Foetus/ Oh the Joy- though is what brought me to the party, though- a perfect dance punk piece of melancholic electro pop. Yes, it sounds like Garbage, and having Shirley Manson ups things enormously. The drums are a bit lame, but for this kinda thing, I think they're supposed to suck. All is forgiven with the bubblegum punk coda Oh the Joy, which can never overstay its Pixie-ish welcome.
Finally, track Eight- Blood in the Gutters is the only one of the many ballads that works on me, but probably because it is so filled with squelch, and flutter like a warped vinyl record, but it resolves into another giant sweeping chorus that sounds like a post punk beach boys gone Joy Division.
Oh, and the title? I suspect some strange feminist/Earth Mother answer is forthcoming, but I remember enough biology that it strikes me as a baby reference- Haploids are sex cells, diploids are animal cells- so when two haploids create a diploid, you've got a baby, geddit?

Good News for me

So, I've got an Amazon Prime membership. I dig several of HBO's series' so yes, good news for me. I think the industry, however is not done mutating. Will it be good for all of us as consumers? I don't know, but consolidation rarely is.I suspect it will be a situation where only the names of the people ripping you off have changed. Still, I gotta be happy about the short term....

Dammit, Tommy

So, I've not been a huge fan of Prong, MK II. I was a big fan when it seemed like Prong was going to be an American equivalent to Killing Joke and Godflesh, but now? Tommy, dude, you've been hanging out with Al too much, man. This thing might have some good songs, hell, I can hear some good riffs in there, but that production? Pro-tooled and V shaped  amateur Metal garbage. Several tracks where all I can hear is kick drums, splashes, and fretboard buzz- I honestly cannot make out any mid range at all. That, whether you're a Metalhead or not, just sounds awful. It's really a bummer, because I so wanted Prong to come back, and roar. Instead, I get this? Very frustrating. I don't like posting negative reviews, and I know virtually no one will care, and that just sucks, because there was such potential there....