The Championship of Advertisements

Birth of The Rosenfelder Index

earbender is about two months old and hopefully after about 25 posts, there are some noticeable trends in my observations and interests. Namely, music, sports, culture, news, exercise/health and the media. Some recent benchmarks include Martin Luther King day, Sundance, Super Bowl Whatever, Bob Marley's birthday and more.

The Rosenfelder Index is the amount it would cost to buy one unit of everything advertised during the Super Bowl. I believe you can tell a lot about the economy and our culture by what is advertised (Remember the burst of www's around 1998? Most of those companies are gone now, even massive ones like go.com.). I named it after myself and this year's findings will be released on earbender.com on January 28.

Incidentally, during the recent LSU-Ohio State Game at the Superdome, I remembered watching the Cowboys-Broncos Super Bowl in 1979 or so when the building was pretty new, state of the art and SO huge. Who could have imagined then that it would be the site of perhaps the greatest disaster relief disaster in U.S. history?

Although I am pleased to see the Superdome back in action, I am very worried about New Orleans and what that Katrina still says about our country. My suggestion: everyone should go to JazzFest sometime in life, and why not 2008? It's an important one, there is still a lot of recovery yet to happen in New Orleans. We can all pitch in by going there and partying like a young W. (except with less coke).

Congrats to former Island artist (and close personal friend) Shelby Lynne who received a massive story in the NY Times Magazine. I'll have some further comments after I read the whole thing, but considering Shelvis was #4 most searched on Yahoo yesterday, she retains the ability to take a nerdy rock critic to the stratosphere.

Willie Nelson is about to drop a new album, coinciding with an appearance on the Super Bowl. The Bowl has been good to Willie, and with a new tour and the album getting good reviews, the run-up to his 75th birthday in April should be fun for us fans. He won't have a wardrobe malfunction but if Trigger makes a funny silhouette like Prince did last year, I'll faint. His new video "Gravedigger" was shot at the cemetery near the graves of Herman Melville and the Great Gildersleeve, and hundreds more, some with familiar names like "Ziegler," "Benson" and "Stewart." And it was a Tuesday!

Speaking of birthdays, Mike Watt sent the video below of him wailing on his 50th. Stand back, it's amazing. Like Rakim says, Watt gets stronger as he gets older!

I happened to space mentioning that earbender client Leonard Cohen made the Rock Hall of Fame. Mazel tov to say the least. Speaking of brushes with fame, vibes to WUSB founder Norm Prusslin on the passing of his friend Johnny Podres, who carried him on his shoulders in the Brooklyn Dodgers' World Series victory parade in 1955.

Also around 1955, Ian Fleming sat at his desk in Oracabessa Jamaica and wrote the incredible 007 stories. In honour of the author's 100th birthday, The UK just issued some pretty nice James Bond stamps, especially if you love vintage book cover art.

In addition to thanking everyone for visiting earbender, I was especially pleased to host our first two visitors from the Southern Hemisphere. Please come back sometime or send me a link to your site. As the man himself would say, "if watt can do it, you can do it!"