Luna is probably the only band in the world whose guitar solos I like better than their verses or choruses or intros or breakdowns or whatever else. Their guitar solos are just breathtakingly gorgeous soaring neon curlicues. They kind of remind me of the opening credits to movies about Las Vegas like The Cooler or whatever, where they pan over the city at night in slow motion with Dean Martin on the soundtrack and the lights are just these smears of color bleeding in the desert. Before last night, I'd only seen Luna live once. I was twenty and living in Brooklyn and working at the Knitting Factory, which is where they were playing to tape two thirds of their live album. I'd never heard them before, but it was free and they weren't jazz, so I went, and I was totally amazed. After that, all their albums sounded just kind of meh - even the live album was just whatever - but they just open up at shows and bounce off each other perfectly and give those solos room to breathe. They played Baltimore last night on their we're-breaking-up tour (sad, but how old are they? pretty old), and they weren't anywhere near as great as the first time, but it was still pretty great. It took them a while to gel perfectly, so the only real sublime moments came in the last 4 or 5 songs, but those songs were no joke. "Indian Summer" is my jam!

Does the new T.I. single sound like Baltimore club music to anyone else? It's got the giant rudimentary clap-stomp drums, the seesawing chopped-up anthemic horns, the insanely recognizable vocal sample repeated over and over. It's not as stripped-down or insistent or fast as most club tracks, but I swear to God the influence is there. It was kind of funny going into Kim's in New York this weekend and seeing all these prominently-displayed white-hipster-kid mix CDs (Diplo, Ayres, Cex) with lots of B-more club on them. White hipster kids know it exists now! Exciting! (To be fair, Cex has been bigging it up for longer than I have, but then again he's from here. And the Diplo and Ayres mixes are great, so I'm not hating. And I don't know anywhere near enough about club music. I just feel cooler than everyone else is all. Simply by virtue of being from Baltimore. That doesn't happen too often.)

The best thing about the bootleg Fade to Black DVD I bought in New York this weekend: the sound is just slightly out of sync with the visuals, so it looks like everyone in Madison Square Garden has no rhythm and can't dance, which is funny.