Solid State

Howdy folks.

I apologize for the lag between posts, but what can I say? I'm a lazy, lazy man. It won't happen again. Haven't I said that before?

Anyway, if you read the physical version of the paper, you are likely aware that we've replaced the Pop Ten. For those of you who follow only online, this is probably news to you since the new section hasn't made its cyberspace debut — we're still working on that.

Due in part to the general decline of independent record stores and in part to the feature being a raging pain in the ass, we rather hastily gave Pop 10 the boot a couple of weeks ago with no real idea of what we were replacing it with.  Seriously, no idea.

Ultimately, we decided to let the space be a sort of free-jazz version of music journalism with no real rules or template. The original installment was an interview with Built To Spill guitarist Brett Netson. The following week was a live review of Gabby and Burette of The Cush at Parima's Acoustic Lounge. Future editions might be editorial rants or photo essays or whatever the hell else I feel like throwing in there. Think of it a a schizophrenic Sound Bites on steroids. Mmmm . . . steroids.

Well, so far so good. We've gotten a good response from the first few stabs and folks are already starting to contact me about future uses of the space — if others want to write it, that's A-OK with me, as long as you don't suck. Please, just don't suck. That's all I ask.

The only real problem is that the feature needs a name. Currently, the spot is known as "The Hole" among Seven Days staff. To me, that doesn't exactly scream destination reading. "Hey. Did you read that shit in The Hole?" No good.

So I call on you, citizens of Solid State. Help me name this thing. If you do, I promise not to ask you anymore Chuck Klosterman questions for a while. Oh, and the winning entry gets a spiffy new Seven Days t-shirt.

The contest is open to anyone and will be announced in this week's Sound Bites, but I thought I'd give you guys first crack at it. Let the games begin!