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Xe Nu

Blackwater Worldwide is abandoning its tarnished brand name as it tries to shake a reputation battered by oft-criticized work in Iraq, renaming its family of two dozen businesses under the name Xe.

The parent company's new name is pronounced like the letter "z."

    Xe your hair smells terrific!
    I am Xe very model of a mercenary general.
    Oh, say can you Xe...

    (future SadlyNo headlines?)

Blackwater Lodge & Training Center - the subsidiary that conducts much of the company's overseas operations and domestic training - has been renamed U.S. Training Center Inc., the company said Friday.

"U.S. Training Center Inc." . That's pretty bland. What about "Xe-Nu Teegeeack Missile Range", or "Xe Thetan Operations Center" ?

Listening To...

  • MGMT - Oracular Spectacular. It took me a little while to get into this one, but after putting it in my car's CD player for a few weeks, I've grown to like it. It's shiny modern alternative electro-pop, very much in the same league as the New Pornographers and Broken Social Scene, but with retro-echoes of things as anachronistic as the Pixies and early Prince.
    Four raquos : » » » »

  • Q-Tip - The Renaissance. Another trial in my eternal quest to find hip-hop that I like which wasn't made in 1992: a new record from the guy who made his name as part of one of those early-90's groups (A Tribe Called Quest). Q-Tip is still as fun as he was back in the day, but the music is much more modern - even being so modern as to pick up on the same early 80's revival vibe as MGMT mines. I like it much better than most of the other modern hip-hop I've been sampling, though I'm afraid a lot of that's because it's so similar to ATCQ.
    Three raquos: » » »

  • Rokia Traoré - Tchamantché. I don't have a lot of experience with music from Mali. I have a little Boubacar Traoré (no relation, AFAIK) and some Ali Farka Touré, and what I have is all bare-bones and hypnotic guitar with repetitive lyrics. You can tell this comes from the same place where those two, older, musicians came from, but this has a much more polished and contemporary production - the recording is better, the sounds are much more balanced, and the songs don't do that heavy repetition. It's quite good. Except for a deconstructed version of Billie Holiday's "The Man I Love", I don't understand any of the words (I think she's singing in French, sometimes) but she has a fine voice and the music is great, so it's still a nice listen.
    Four raquos : » » » »

  • Andrew Bird - Noble Beast. I'm still waiting for this to grab me. It feels low on hooks and high on mellow. I can't bring myself to rate it.
  • Update, also: The Fratellis - Flathead EP. Do you like the new punk-esque sounds of the Hives, the Vines, Artic Monkeys, etc? Well, you might like The Fratellis, too.