Ah, summer, when things slow down and nothing much happens. Unless you fail to post for a couple of weeks and let things pile up. For example...

Joe Pernice has loosed a new song on the world. "Somerville," a new track from the Pernice Brothers' forthcoming disc, Live a Little, is available for download at the band's site. The verdict? It's a Pernice Brothers song, with all that implies. It has a strong hook and a sweet arrangement that's all chiming guitars and swirling organs. There's a video as well, though it's, um, storyline and production values make Pernice's "Indie Rock Cribs" experiments from last year seem positively Hollywood in comparison.

Crime novelist Mickey Spillane died Monday; Sarah at Confessions of an Idiosyncratic Mind has the best roundup of relevant links I've seen today.

Proving that death is still the best career move, Johnny Cash posted his first no. 1 album since 1969 with the just released American V: A Hundred Highways. Showing how down the industry is, he hit the mark by moving only 88,000 copies. Still, it's nice to see that quality music can still move a few units in this pre-fab, disposable days.

The New York Times looks at the decline in mom 'n pop record stores. The hook this time is that the clientele's average age is creeping ever upward as young people avoid recordings like the plague.

The Guardian this weekend published a list of the 50 albums that changed music over the 50 years the pop music charts have been in existence there. In a nice move, they explain what makes these so groundbreaking. The Velvet Underground and Nico is a predictable no. 1, but with Kraftwerk's Trans-Europe Express and N.W.A.'s Straight Out of Compton also in the top 5, it's clear some thought went into this.