Halfway around the world, in a whole ‘nother arena, there’s Israel, which could easily be portrayed as a victimized, nerdy, but ultra-productive minority group kid, in a neighborhood of intolerant bullies who have no better way to spend their energies than to obsess on destroying that little kid who lives a house or two down the block.

The kid is peppered each day with pushing, shoving, taunts, and crude rockets supplied by Iranian arms dealers. But the kid keeps his cool, until finally he can’t, and leaves the house one morning on his treacherous walk to school with a 44 Magnum in one of the side pockets of his backpack. His intent is to stop the bullying, but the kid’s at wit’s end, so he fires at the bullies while they’re trying to blend into the schoolyard crowd. Some innocent bystanders get shot as well. The kid feels lousy but has been pushed to the international version of temporary insanity.

Now Israel doesn’t give good PR. So their intense reaction to daily harassment is seen as the precipitating aggression. Their civilian casualties don’t get a tenth of the airtime that those in the Gaza Strip do. The nerd, who would rather play chess and do DNA research, is portrayed as the perp. The street gang is portrayed as the victim. The U.N. buys in. No big surprise there.

Which is why Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak ought to put Britney’s publicists on speed dial, make them an offer they can’t refuse, and have them do for his country what they did for Ms. Spears.

                          

The Man In Me by Rodney Crowell. Crowell is a major thinker who uses instrumentation that cause his records to be filed in the country category. The lyrics are a ruthless and eloquent self-examination/dressing down and a guitar riff straight out of Duane Eddy fills in the blanks.

Re-Ron, by Gil Scott-Heron. Rewind to when rappers placed a premium on urgency and literacy, and dealt with matters far more noble than misogyny and the Benjamins. Someone very close to me mixed the record.

Handlebars by Flobots. The first 30 seconds provoked the question “what is this crap?” but by the end I knew it was anything but. Hi IQ and social consciousness that captures the complexity of day to day existence in 2008 meets infectious production.

Hate Me by Blue October. More brutal self-examination and confession that makes the spate of current books by addicts sharing war stories seem like child’s play. First time I heard it I had to pull off a highway because I had never been faced with anything that riveting framed so well, and I couldn’t handle the wheel and listen at the same time. And I’m not half bad at multi-tasking.

                          

Time to resume the ritual. All cuts are available on iTunes:

Don’t Do It, by Little Charlie and the Nightcats. After angsting over primaries, gas prices, and the planet reminding us, via tornadoes and earthquakes, that it’s not a passive bystander, a little stress relief is called for, and here it is.

Do the Panic, by Phantom Planet. This one angsts over all of the above and throws in enough ear candy that you might not notice it without multiples listens with a lyric sheet.

Just for Me, by Al Green. Got to hand it to someone who not only doesn’t lose a step, but gets deeper and richer than the deep and rich that’s been there for decades. Great old school, classy arrangement.

Monkeyshines, by Palumbo. Written 3 years ago, yet speaks to what’s happening right now to tens of millions of people who are having trouble making ends meet, and the ones who are doing just fine thank you, even though some of their shenanigans (think sub-prime lending) put the folks that are struggling where they are.

                          

Wreck of the Day by Anna Nalick. The most promising female singer songwriter to come along in some time. My understanding is that the A & R person who championed this wonderful artist and album is now out of a job, and people wonder why the music business is dying. It’s not illegal downloads, it’s lack of quality worth paying for.

Tiger Woods by Dan Bern. If you’ve got kids, it might be better to ask them to leave the room before giving this one a listen. Addresses the consequences of peaking early in one’s life and then feeling that everything that follows is a letdown. Uses a unique incident to illustrate the point. Bern is a cynic who will simply not let anyone or anything beat the hope out of him.

Choices by Bettye Lavette. Don’t bother trying to write or perform a song about regret unless you’re willing to have it dwarfed by this stunning and stark piece of material.

Hate (I Really Don’t Like You) by Plain White T’s. Sophomoric, yes. Vengeful, yes. Fun to listen to, hell yeah.

                          

Shine On by Eric Bibb. Instant inspiration; pay $300 to a shrink or listen to this song repeatedly for 50 minutes. Your call.

Believe by The Bravery. Man’s search for meaning; Viktor Frankl channeled through MTV. I worked with their drummer on the Mappari album in 2001.

Night By Night by Steely Dan. Getting through the daily scams one seamy day at a time; a journey of a thousand miles beginning with the first dark, murky step.

Train In the Distance by Paul Simon. Hope never really dies, it just takes a break from time to time. The sax player on the outro is a sinfully funny guy I haven’t laughed with in way too long.

We’ve Got Everything by Modest Mouse. Infectious music; lyrics that manage to be both arrogant and self-mocking.

Enjoy. LK

                          

Today’s record companies are run either by private equity poobahs whose idea of talent is the rating they give the girls at the Gentlemen’s Club, or by well paid slaves of publicly traded companies. In the latter case, now that this part of the art world needs to report quarterly results, there is no chance for the type of artist development that would lead to both lengthy, productive careersand artists that generate billions of dollars in revenue. The same holds true for the companies under the control of private equity, with the drive for numbers no less intense but a lot more hush-hush.

Case in point: The Red Hot Chili Peppers. Beginning in 1984, the band released 3 albums that made no money for their record company. Their fourth album scratched its way onto the Billboard Top 200, and their fifth album, Blood Sugar Sex Magik, released 7, count ‘em 7 years after their first public exposure broke the band wide open. My educated guess is that they’ve done at least a half a billion dollars worth of business including record sales, concert grosses, and merchandising.

In today’s environment they would have been dropped (the equivalent of fired) by their record company after album #2 at the latest, and whoever green-lighted that second album would have been sent packing as well. Today’s myopic morons in their corner offices can learn something from professional sports GM’s who bring talent along at a pace that just might bear some fruit. The Joba rules come to mind (google the phrase if you’re unfamiliar with the context).

One thing shared by both the music and sports biz is that both tolerate and even indulge talented types with drug problems, making them major enablers. Although the drugs of choice are as different as, oh, say, steroids and heroin, dope is dope.

And dope brings us conveniently back to the folks running the major label record companies.