I got the new Eno and it’s great, I’ve been listening to a lot, but there seems to be something pathetic and middle-aged about taking so much pleasure in an album that sounds like the most exciting music of 30 years ago, like going to a restaurant and ordering macaroni and cheese. Still I have been listening to it a lot.

I also got "Vintage Violence" on vinyl, filling a 20-year lacuna in my record collection. "Someone took the tuba for a pony ride and the music sounded so much better"--how true these words are. I’m surprised that the Nick Drake-revival crowd hasn’t brought this album back big time, along with "Paris 1919".

But back with a vengeance is Gang of Four, whose "I Found That Essence Rare" was the Paca-Carroll Basement Hit of 1980. Yup, apparently they’re doing a reunion tour, and all the hip new bands site them as an influence. Fine by me, but why them and not say, Marie & the Garcons or the Aural Exciters? And whatever happened to Jimmy Skafish?