(Editor’s note:  That’s not my living room up there.  It’s a photo of The Who on a huge TV in an immaculate entertainment room that I found on Flickr.  Pretty good visual metaphor for the current state of the band that recorded The Who Sell Out, no?

Three quick things on the Super Bowl before we dive into this most recent edition of the singles club.

1. The Who – Let me preface this by saying that I love The Who as much as any other band on the planet.  A cassette copy of Meaty, Beaty, Big and Bouncy was the first “record” that I really owned.  I listen to Who’s Next as much as any other album in the ipod.  That said, I have to be mean for a minute:

They stopped being The Who in 1978 when Keith Moon died.  At least they had a quorum until John Entwistle passed away.  Now they’re just two dudes who used to be in a band called The Who.  Worse, they’re two dudes who are (at best) pseudo-tragic shadows of themselves: Daltrey trying to maintain his impish flair despite the fact that he looks (and sounds) like Jack Lemmon, Townshend flailing through the windmill cause it’s all he has left. If they would have played “My Generation” it would have broken irony for the rest of us.  The whole thing just made me sad.

2. Grizzly Bear – Really?  Volkswagen?  Now when I hear one of the five best songs ever recorded, I immediately think of Stevie Wonder punching Tracy Morgan.  Bastards.  I’m pretty excited to see “While You Wait for Others” in an ad for hemorrhoids cream or some shit.  I get it, Droste et al. will say yes to any offer to liscense their music for anything.  Ugh.

3. Arcade Fire – Good on those guys for a whole bunch of reasons.  They gave the money the NFL spent on “Wake Up” to Haiti and the track is currently #98 on the itunes singles list.  So everybody wins.  The band throws Haiti some love, tons of folks get exposed to an amazing band and (I’d wager) the residuals they’re going to get from increased sales on a six year old song will probably be a pretty penny.  That’s the kind of “selling out” that’s easy to get behind.

The final tally for the Super Bowl musically:  one legendary act continues to shit on our memories of their glory days, one uber-genius indie act continues to shit on our ability to take their art seriously and another uber-genius indie act does the right thing for people in need and themselves.  Hmm.  Not such a bad Sunday, I guess.

On to the Singles Club.  Blimp, the nom de rock of Dave Girtsman, popped into our inbox unexpectedly this week.  The track starts with a mellow acoustic and Girtsman’s oddly captivating vocals luling the listener into a bit of a trance.  Things get really intersting at the two minute mark, when a spaced out slide comes in and the song drops into a slightly higher gear.  Throughout, the song maintains a certain level of cool detachment, kind of dancing three feet away from you, teasing you in, then spinning away.  The hook is the thing that gets me, but the hushed tone keeps me coming back.  You can hear more Blimp here.

Blimp – You Can’t Tell Me

I’m late to warm to the glo-fi thing.  (If, like me, you’re late to the party, read this post from IGIF for the best exploration of the terminology and, to a degree, the genre itself.)  Essentially all I’ve been listening to for the last week is Washed Out and Small Black.  (Quick aside:  Is Small Black a play on Big Black?  If so, it’s one of the best ever names for a band.  If the Small Black dudes are unaware of Big Black, I’ll just be pissed off.)  My new fascination with bedroom psych might be due to my recent foray into fatherhood.  This stuff is the best music possible for babies; mine loves the fuzzed down vocals and mellowed out keys; I’m pretty sure that it sounds like the inside of the womb.  Washed Out’s “New Theory” might be the best lullabye ever written.  True story.  Put that thing on and my little fellow is out like a light.  The track below isn’t far behind.

Small Black – Despicable Dogs