1.) "Lick It Before You Stick It" - Denise Lasalle, 2000
A Taste: "You're makin' her feel good, but you can make her feel better/ If you treat your lady like a stamp and a letter"

2.) "Downtown" - SWV, 1992
A Taste: "Go downtown/ To taste the sweetness"

3.) "Not Tonight" - Lil' Kim, 1996
A Taste: "I don't want dick tonight/ Eat my pussy right"

4.) "My Neck, My Back" - Khia, 2002
A Taste: "My neck, my back/ Lick my pussy and my crack"

5.) "Put It In Your Mouth" - Akinyele, 1996
A Taste: "Or you just could eat me out"

6.) "I Luv" - Too $hort featuring Trick Daddy, Scarface & Daz, 2001
A Taste: "I luv gettin' my pussy ate"

7.) "Candy" - Foxy Brown featuring Kelis, 2001
A Taste: "Let me know when you're ready to eat"

8.) "J.O.D.D." - Trick Daddy featuring Trina, 2004
A Taste: "Sucka suck on da clit/ Just suck on da clit"

9.)"Sugar" - Bikini Kill, 1993
A Taste: "What are you afraid of?"

10.) "Work It" - Missy Elliott, 2002
A Taste: "You do or you don't or you will or you won't cha/ Go downtown and eat it like a vulcha"

11.) "Face" - Rick Ross featuring Trina, 2009
A Taste: "Sittin' at the green light/ 'Cause I'm gettin' face."

12.) "Tongue Song" - Trina, 2000
A Taste: "Head like wut wut wut/ Hands all on my butt butt butt/ Ya need to lick it again c'mon"

13.) "How Many Licks" - Lil' Kim, 2001
A Taste: "Roll some weed with some tissue and close your eyes/ Then imagine your tongue in between my thighs"

14.) "Any Time, Any Place" - Janet Jackson, 1994
A Taste: "I can feel your hand moving up my thighs/ Skirt around my waist/ Wall against my face/ I can feel your lips"

15.) "Lick It" - 20 Fingers, 1995
A Taste: "You gotta lick it/ Before we kick it"

16.) "Glory" - Liz Phair, 1993
A Taste: "You are, you are shining some glory on me"

17.) "Red Light Special" - TLC, 1994
A Taste: "Take a good look at it/ Look at it now"

18.) "Where Life Begins" - Madonna, 1992
A Taste: "Dining in and eating out/ I guess that's what this song's about"

19.) "Twist" - Goldfrapp, 2003
A Taste: "Put your dirty angel face/ Between my legs"

20.) "Bliss" - Mariah Carey, 1999
A Taste: "Take it down low/ Make me get high"

• Dita Von Teese wears two Elie Saab couture creations in her limited-run Paris show. Is it strange that the only people who can afford couture these days are burlesque artists and Saudi princesses? [IHT]

• Fashion week is "hitting the reset button" because in this economic climate, return on investment is ever more important. [WWD]
• And don't expect any parties. Really. [WWD]
• The show schedule is now available online. [The Cut]
• Christian Siriano will be there, in the Salon at the tents, showing his new collection for Payless. Which is good news because at $25-$45 for bags and shoes inspired by Egyptology, these are that rare affordable fashion week thing. [WWD]
• Interesting: Richie Rich, everyone's favorite glittering ex-club kid, is showing on February 18. At no less a venue than the Waldorf Astoria, demonstrating once and for all that his particular brand of sparkle can exist above 23rd St. There hasn't been much heard of Rich since the end of his old label, Heatherette, which he ran with Traver Rains. [The Cut]
• Rich is promising "Head-to-toe wearable" for his namesake collection. Wonder how this'll shake out. [WWD]
• Isaac Mizrahi already showed his fall/winter collection for Liz Claiborne. It looks good, and involves something called "Kaleidoplaid." [Style.com]
• And the re-re-animated Halston is forgoing a show in favor of a video it's going to e-mail to editors and buyers on Saturday. [WWD]
• PETA's also gearing up for its favorite parasitic marketing opportunity of the year. Giorgio Armani, who stopped using all fur except for, it claims, rabbit pelts left over from the meat industry, recently drew the pressure group's ire and his New York flagship store will be picketed. [NYDN]
• Jason Wu, the American Vogue cover getting, Michelle Obama outfitting, 26-year-old fashion superstar, is to be sold on Net-A-Porter.com. [UK Elle]
• New York Magazine has 10 models to watch this season, you know, just some real new faces like that girl who walked for Marc Jacobs that one time and that girl in the current Prada campaign. [The Cut]
• Finally, a fashion magazine for the girls who smoke cigarettes behind the parking lot at school and could tell a Steven Meisel from a Steven Klein at 50 paces before entering their teens. Carine Roitfeld, editor-in-chief of French Vogue, is rumored to be assembling a team to launch a biannual teen fashion magazine. French Teen Vogue! Ooh la la. [FWD]
• Chanel Iman is supposedly to have a walk-on part on Gossip Girl as a guest at one of Serena's parties. A tipster reports she ate macaroni and cheese for lunch. (Chanel's still at that age where you can eat anything and not gain an ounce. Sigh.) [Daily Intel]
• Emma Roberts, Julia's niece, is another new face of Neutrogena. [WWD]
• Lorenzo Martone, Marc Jacobs' boyfriend of 11 months, seems like a charming romantic. "Valentine's Day is two days before his show, it has to be very quiet, but I'm still planning a little surprise," says the Brazilian. "During the last Vuitton show in Paris, I didn't tell him I was going to go — I just showed up in Paris in his office with flowers as a surprise the day before the show. He was totally, totally surprised. It was really, really good to see his reaction, and I don't know — we are so in love that it was really gorgeous to see his eyes." My heart, it's melting now. [The Cut]
• Two acts who grew up in Illinois, Liz Phair and OK Go!, are among the musicians featured in Banana Republic's New York-themed spring campaign, which will be out on February 18. [Brand Week]
• The "Got Milk?" campaign is the latest concern to drop alleged domestic abuser Chris Brown from its roster. Cover Girl says it's standing by Rihanna. [E! Online]
• Jones Apparel Group posted a slightly smaller-than-expected quarterly loss of 4 cents a share. (Analysts had expected 5 cents.) Revenues for the company even rose, by 1%, to $846.9 million. Let us all cheer not-bad fashion business news! [NY Times]
• Nike is cutting 4% of its 35,000-strong workforce. [WWD]
• Bob Marley's family has licensed his image and name, along with catchphrases like "Catch a fire" and "One Love" to the company Hilco Consumer Capital, which paid some $20 million in the deal. Hilco already owns Ellen Tracy and Linens 'n' Things. [Reuters]
• Hadley Freeman scored the first interview with Phoebe Philo, newly of Celine. Marco Gobetti, the LVMH vice-president with whom Philo is rumored to already be clashing, makes an uncomfortable joke about having to "cover up the bruises" — his, or Philo's, it's not clear — before the journalist arrived. [Guardian]
• The New York Times' critical shopper visited the new Brooks Brothers Black Fleece store in the West Village, and found the Thom Browne-designed line very interesting if not ultimately practical. (There are fit issues with the womenswear.) Still, the theory is good: "Picture a cross between Pee-wee Herman and Nurse Ratched, only more obsessive-compulsive. It is a look so stiffly starched - all the buttons are just so very, very buttoned, both up and down - as to recall corsetry, humane restraint devices or orthopedic inserts. It is a look that may mold and instruct the wearer in his relentless quest for superior health, posture and hygiene. As the 'Goldberg Variations' were to Glenn Gould, these clothes seem to be both the tools and execution of a meticulously tended neurosis." [NY Times]
• This sounds awesome: Prada has asked four stylists, including Carine Roitfeld and Katie Grand, to style their stores in New York, London, Paris and Milan. Anyone not in those cities can see the project online. [WWD]
• Whoa. Raquel Welch is shilling reading glasses. I suppose One Million Years B.C. was a long time ago. [Brand Freak]
• There's an entertaining and thoughtful Q&A with someone named Chicken John Rinaldi, who apparently led the fight against the proposed American Apparel on Valencia St. in San Francisco. Rinaldi comes off rather well: "It depends on whose liberty you are defending. Are you defending the liberty of American Apparel to open a store wherever they want? Or are you defending the liberty of the people who live on the block? Or are you defending the people who shop at the store? Or are you going to defend the liberty of the people who own the other stores whose rents are without question going to quadruple?" [Mother Jones]
• And now, our daily minute of hate: Italian brand Relish's new campaign, shot in Rio de Janeiro but featured now on billboards in Italy, features men dressed as Rio cops molesting women as they arrest them. [Shakesville]

The Breeders success has always been painted by rock critics as a 90s anomaly. It all started when the Pixies fell apart in the early 90s, which was due, in part, to Kim's mounting popularity. Some say that lead singer Frank Black couldn't handle being second banana, and so Kim struck out on her own, forming a rag-tag band which eventually included her identical twin sister Kelley, who was working as a computer programmer and had never played guitar before. According to Ethan Smith, who wrote a telling and entertaining profile of the Breeders for the Times Magazine when they released Title TK in 2002, "In most musical eras, this would hardly be a recipe for chart-topping success. But courageous amateurism was all the rage in the early 90's. In their quest for authenticity, fans and record executives alike were seeking underdogs to make into heroes."

Well, it's 2008 now, and a love of ballsy dilettantism has been replaced by a vocoder nation. When I arrived at Brooklyn's McCarren Pool for the Breeders show yesterday, I expected a bunch of fellow 90s enthusiasts who remembered when Last Splash was a big hit in 1993 and wanted to worship (and reminisce) at the altar of the sisters Deal. Instead, I found a park filled with 19-year-olds in unholy hybrids of short shorts and mom jeans (see fig. A at the bottom of this post).

It was hot, and even the snuggly confines of the free-booze filled VIP section couldn't make up for the sun's unyielding rays on our aged flesh. My friends and I ended up putting a makeshift tarp over our heads and offering sunblock to scantily clad and quickly reddening youngins like the crazy old ladies that we were. We got there around 3 and the Breeders didn't take the stage until 5:30 or so, which meant that we spent the better part of two hours counting the number of girls wearing rompers (12) and Keds (7) and rompers and Keds (1).

When the Breeders finally came on, we didn't have the energy to push our way to the front of undulating mass at the front of the stage, so we hung back in the shade and listened to Kim and Kelley (fig. B). I was hoping for one of the twins' famous public spats (from the 2002 Times article: "Suddenly the slumber party has become an episode of ''Judge Hatchett.'' Close your eyes and the twins' flat-accented, not-quite-identical altos — a source of fascinating musical effects on disc and stage — sound like one extremely unhinged woman on the brink of wringing her own neck.") but the Breeders' performance was smooth and professional. Though after decades of hard living, at 46 they're looking a little worse for the wear, Kim's clear and femme voice sounded the same as it ever did, which is to say occasionally transcendent. Most of the romper-clad audience didn't appear to be superfans like me, but they certainly appreciated the rock that Kim and co. were slinging almost as much as they appreciated self-consciously watching each other's outfits.

We left early, before the encore, because we didn't want to have to wait in the endless line that would undoubtedly form at the park's exit. I was happy to see that the hipster masses would still congregate in droves to hear Kim Deal, but I can't say I loved the show. I'm too old and cranky to deal with the crowds and the smell and the lines and the rancid portapotties. This was the second time I'd seen the Breeders. The first time was in 2002. What's remarkable about Kim Deal is that through several different band changes and life changes, she's been remarkably consistent. She still makes the same lo-fi, stripped down rock and keeps the same unkempt, fuck-you image that made her a commercial success in 1993. Though critics might not know what to do with aging female rock stars, female rock stars know what to do with themselves: keep making music.

Wait! One more thing. 40something female rock stars keep making music, but they also revive amazing flame wars in glossy magazines with similarly aged dude rockers. "You know, [Pavement’s Stephen] Malkmus is being a bit of a bitch in interviews recently," Kim said in April to Time Out. "One thing he said last summer referred to me as 'trashy mouth.' And he just did this article in Spin where he alluded to me unpleasantly, saying [something like], “You know, I always thought that Pavement could have had one of those big hits in the early ’90s with ‘Cut Your Hair,’ but I guess people preferred ‘Cannonball.’…God, man, “Cut Your Hair” isn’t as good of a song as 'Cannonball,' so fuck you. How’s that? Your song was just a’ight, dawg." Kim, I might be too old and lame to like concerts, but you're still my hero.

Fig. A: a denim romper:

Fig. B: our crappy, old lady view from the back of the crowd:

She Is a Punk Rocker [New York Times Magazine]
Cool As Kim Deal [Village Voice]
The Hot Seat: Kim Deal [Time Out New York]

Relateed: Rompers, Jellies, And Denim: A Summer Sunday In Williamsburg [Style.com]

MOE: So let us consider the concert we just attended. For starters, that guy Paul. When I broke up with my last boyfriend I met him through our mutual friend Don, who introduced me to breakup songs other than Divorce Song, such as I Want You by Elvis Costello and Go On Ahead, also by Liz Phair, which is probably underappreciated.

JESS: oh that's one of my favorites from whitechocolatespace egg
and randomly i knew paul through my old job as a music critic, which feels like another lifetime

MOE: But yeah, so…what made you feel oldest last night? The $13 drinks? The fact that half the males in attendance were not graying but actually GRAY? Or lyrics like "You're probably shy and introspective that's not part of my objective I just want your fresh young jimmy cramming slamming ramming in me"

JESS: that was also the time when "fuck and run" really meant something to me
also they were all wearing button downs over their paunches
the graying men that is

MOE: Also we went to a nice restaurant afterwards with Kara Jesella and Marisa Meltzer, who wrote the Sassy book, and they were playing Portishead's second album, to which I knew all the words, and in the car they played both SWV and Tevin Campbell and I knew all the words and in the club after the show they played Bjork's Homogenic and seriously EVERYTHING ABOUT THE NIGHT WAS SO FUCKING NINETIES except, of course, for the prices, which ranged from $16 for my sandwich to upwards of three hundred for whatever cute shoes Kara was probably wearing and, um, oh my god it is so not the nineties anymore, because in the nineties it was our parents who were re-purchasing their record collections on CD and investing in new Dolby sound systems and Don't Stop Thinking About Tomorrow was the Clintons' campaign anthem only ironically all ANYONE was thinking about was yesterday, except us! Because Liz Phair was so amazing and cool and revolutionary and ALTERNATIVE.

JESS: um, see, i always though of it as more or less adolescent instead of 90s per se
but maybe the 90s was about indulging your extended adolescence!
though i feel it will ring true for generations of disaffected teens tk

MOE: Basically what I am saying is that our corner of New York is a pricey nineties theme park, one someone is surely working hard to duplicate in Dubai, and so, when she said she always thought of Exile — she just called it Exile, right? — as a "New York album" I found that distinctly problematic.
Because in New York none of us would have fallen in love with those losers and Liz Phair anyway would be in therapy.

JESS: well that was just pandering, but perhaps in our corner of new york everyone is pandering
to us and our neurosis!
so at this point liz phair is a simulacrum of liz phair
is that what you're getting at?

MOE: Sort of, and like, if I were listening to this album today or here, "Never Said" might be my favorite song. But like, "Shatter" and "Strange Loop" would have seemed off.
Stratford-On-Guy and Johnny Sunshine as opposed, you know, to "Canary"

JESS: But! That's because we're olds now
not because it's the aughts

MOE: But last night, thooooose were the songs I sang loudest

JESS: I mean I think it's an intensely personal album

MOE: And didn't have to think about the words to.

JESS: I still relate to Canary
Because I am a pollyanna!
Who wishes she were more transgressive

MOE: Yeah I don't think I've related to Canary for a little while, but that's because Catholic education makes everyone feel like a disobedient fuckup I guess.

JESS: When I hear Fuck and Run now, it's like watching a sepia-toned film reel

MOE: I'm not going to be ashamed that "I have a lot of work to do" is something that gets said in the morning post sex in my case fairly often. I guess because I'm usually the one to say it. But yeah, I remember listening to that song over and over again in the late stages of my first relationship and thinking, "Wait, that used to be me. I wonder if it still is me!" Hahahaha and almost ten years later why yes it is! Just not every day.

JESS: I sometimes miss it
it was exciting
the fuck and run period
I still relate Stratford-on-Guy
relate to

MOE: So Marisa had seen the documentary, which is apparently crap. (A lot of these movies are I guess, though my sister liked the Wilco movie, which I still haven't seen, but there was this hardcore movie out recently and I saw it in LA and it was soooooo goddamn bad, it was like they hadn't even read Our Band Could Be Your Life. Anyway, the important part is here is the trailer and apparently Steve Albini of Urge Overkill was there and he was NOT looking hot.

JESS: OMG I was so sad i missed seeing him
It needs to be said that Liz was looking hot
It also needs to be said that perhaps it's the HWC
sorry. I needed to get that out of my system.

MOE: Ew ew ew. Personally, I think she should lay off the highlights and tight
dresses. And the lipgloss that be poppin. Just me. But whatever, yes, she looked hot. MILFy. Made me want to lay off the Parliaments I guess.
Oh my god, watch the trailer, that guy we met last night is in it! Who became friends with Liz somehow. Which is so cool! I would have talked to him, but I think I was too drunk and also, distracted by the Portishead.

JESS: I think her hair might have been a weave though! I peeped it closely when we came in

MOE: See, I like how she looks about 1:35 into this trailer.

JESS: but we did discover that his girlfriend also has her period super frequently, JUST LIKE US
DAVE MATTHEWS?
why is she only talking to dudes about it though

MOE: Wait, Dave Matthews is in it? I thought it was just some guys who looked like Dave Matthews. Oh wait, because the reissue is on his label, like Ben Kweller. I read once that she owned her masters which is why she could do that. Smart! I think she is talking to dudes because it's about Guyville. Obviously their antipathy is a lot more interesting than our adulation. Or maybe it's not. I so wish they'd interviewed Hitchens. Memo to Graydon Carter: command Hitchens to review this movie immediately!

JESS: hahahahahahahah
WELL her band was also all dudes
Except for that one bitch who got up to sing FLower
It's not necessarily a judgment, merely an observation.
That was definitely Dave Matthews. His voice is really distinctive

MOE: Actually I don't think Brits really get Liz Phair, which is one of the reasons I listened to it so much in Hong Kong, and also ironic, considering that the Stones are British…I think the Brits understand Liz Phair perhaps less than they understand Cantonese. But anyway, this is a thing: is there a British counterpart? Justine Frischmann was also a heroine (heh) of mine but she was so much genuinely cooler than Liz Phair. Which is why I don't think she's doing very much right now. Though she gave the world M.I.A. (Rad.)

Dave Matthews fucked like half the girls in the Virginia high schools' classes 1992-98. I was not in that half though.

JESS: oh i LOOOOOOOVe justine
what about P.J. Harvey
she's a limey

MOE: But like, Justine was more of a Kim Gordon type right? well no Kim Gordon held it together.

JESS: Also Justine was never as personal. I always felt Elastica's music was more fun than thoughtful necessarily
Kim Gordon is another can of worms
maybe Justine is like Kim Deal

MOE: But Liz was not like that, she did not desire to be a scene elder, she just wanted to tell those guys off and then go live happily ever after I guess. Good for her! But no, I don't really think that, the same way I don't really think it's true that "You can be shallow and deep and read celebrity tabloids and the Zimbabwe election and there's no conflict" the way Kim France would have you believe. There's only so much time, and just because those guys are pricks doesn't mean you necessarily should have wasted yours getting made over by Avril Lavigne, Liz! Although Linda Hirshman would probably approve since you were just trying to get paid.

JESS: Yeah, I thought that was her entire rationale
she has a kid now
she needs to make some cash

actually, i wrote this open letter to liz after her disastrous chicks with attitude tour

wow, even reading things i wrote four years ago is really embarrassing

MOE: Everything about the past is embarrassing. Like, reading this exchange in 10 minutes when I post it: probably gonna be embarrassing.

UPDATE: Yeah guys, I know who Steve Albini is because, as I pointed out, I read that book Our Band Could Be Your Life, I just had a brainfart, thanks for your concerns. The guy Marisa saw was actually named Nash Kato, which is totally the name of someone you'd think was really cool in the nineties.

Though the New York Times pop music section is edited by the incomparable Sia Michel, almost all of the writers are dudes. The editorial staff — particularly on the higher rungs — of Rolling Stone is mostly male. Of the twelve editorial staffers listed on Pitchfork's website, there are 2 women. Of course, the paucity of females writing about music in the most influential publications bespeaks a larger sexism in the music business. Yes, 50% of the top selling artists this week are female, but they're all, to a woman (Rihanna, Natasha Beddingfield, the abhorrent Katy Perry, etc.) beautiful, under 25, and singing pop. Several of them do not write their own songs, and their popularity is largely driven by their packaging, not their music.

In her review of whitechocolatespaceegg, Laura Sinagra writes, "Phair's genius has always been for fantasies sprung from the precise pen of the passive observer. Her first songs weren't about thinking on your feet, or slinging zingers at the straw-man rockboy she called Johnny Sunshine; they were about crafting retorts later in your bedroom and living off their power." Perhaps the future female music critics, as well as the future music makers, should use Phair's specific genius as guide.

Why Can't Women Be Geniuses Too? [Times of London]
What Makes You Happy [City Pages]

I realize that the music industry has changed so drastically since 1993, when Exile in Guyville came out, that indie rock has ceased to mean anything whatsoever, but I wonder what the girls like me and Moe are listening to today; not the girls who worship Rihanna and that fucking Katy Perry we get 10,000 press releases about (apparently Perry's single "I Kissed A Girl," is number 2 on iTunes. Sample lyric: "I kissed a girl just to try it, hope my boyfriend don't mind it."). I mean the girls who read Sylvia Plath and write bad poetry and secretly hate everyone and themselves. Who are they listening to?

I asked some friends who write about music, and they seem to think the days of apathy are over. "Indie rock" girls are either like M.I.A and Santogold, awesome, multicultural and political but also optimistic; or they're folk-y twee beauties like Regina Spektor and Joanna Newsom. I want to draw ties between music and the Clintons and Obama (the Clintons = apathetic 90s = Liz Phair; Obama = activist-y, optimistic aughts = M.I.A.) but blogging doesn't give me the time to flesh that out so I don't sound idiotic.

But you know, the music industry is a huge and sprawling thing these days since no one pays for music anymore anyway. There has to be some room for lonely ladies who will tell you that we're all going to die. Can anyone tell me where they are?

Sound Of A Generation [NPR]
Earlier: Did Liz Phair Predict Your Life Or Did She Actually Dictate It?

I was sheltered, but I was not an idiot. Not even in the Weekly World News did 12-year-olds have one-night stands; that was not what this was about; it was about original sin. Not everyone had it, but Liz did, I did. My crippling wholesomeness was an accident of circumstance. I was a foreign service kid, not someone genetically predisposed to such violent dorkdom; I stared out every day at the lunch table surrounded by Model UN and Wind Ensemble kids and knew there were things separating us. My destiny was to be a tomboyish slut who smoked lots of cigarettes and a "list" so long with dudes who flinched and averted their eyes and wrote checks they couldn't keep and had a lot of work to do that I couldn't remember the last name that pulled that crap and I actually allowed it to hurt.

And lo, it totally happened.

Francis Chung is now an art history professor I think. We keep meaning to get drinks and trade CDs. I'm afraid I wouldn't have anything new to give him.

And in other news, prodigious talent Leslie Jamison sent me a Facebook message admitting that she actually did write that awesome defense of saccharin mainly because it was easier than trying to compete with the superior CD collection of the dude she was trying to impress.

15 Years Later, Liz Phair Revisits 'Guyville' [NPR]

• Nelson Mandela personally called Amy Winehouse and asked her to sing at his birthday party on June 27! The former president of South Africa phoned her! Bono, Elton John and Annie Lennox are expected to perform as well. This UK paper says,"Let's hope [Amy] bee-hives herself!" Yuk, yuk. [Mirror]
  
• Meanwhile: Does Blake Incarcerated have a secret mistress? Is he plotting with the "mystery blonde" to run away with her — and a chunk of Amy's £10 million fortune? [The Sun]
  
• Britney Spears and Kevin Federline are due in court today for a progress review. A completely uninformed opinion? She's doing better. [People]
  
• Owen Wilson allegedly picked up some chick (not Kate Hudson) and invited her back to is boat and propositioned her to join him in a threesome with Vince Vaughn. There was a time that a Butterscotch Stallion/Money Baby sandwich would have been soooo hot, and that time was 2001. [Perez Hilton]
  
• Britney's back at work on How I Met Your Mother. She looks cute dressed to match Neil Patrick Harris! [TMZ]

• Tom Cruise's new web site is a finely crafted masterpiece of PR spin. [LA Times]
• Prince! Is working on a book! Featuring poetry and photographs and elegantly sealed in a purple slipcase, of course. [Reuters]
• Dina Lohan is being honored as a "Top Mom" by a Long Island-based charity, Mingling Moms Organization. Ali Lohan says: "My mom is great, she has always been there for us. She helps us follow our dreams. I love her to death." And by "to death" she means, "Sometimes I want to strangle her." [Page Six]
• Pete Doherty is out of jail! He served 29 days of a 14-week sentence and now he's back on the streets. You've been warned. [People]
• John Mayer on the pix of him with Jen Aniston in Miami: "Listen, this is not a scandal, this is not an issue, this is not a problem, this needs no spin control. This is me living my life and a guy with a really powerful lens and I don't fault him, I don't fault anybody, I don't fault you, I don't fault this or that. There are much worse problems in the world. Everything's cool!" Hahaha, stoner. [ET]
• But! John Mayer was seen out with Maroon 5 horndog Adam Levine and John "The Player" was "all over some blond girl," according to a source. Maybe he and Jennifer Aniston haven't had "the talk" yet? [Page Six]
• Maxim's Hot 100 list is a sister act: Ashlee Simpson is No. 18, Jessica Simpson is No. 53. But while Ashley Olsen is No. 47, Mary-Kate is not on the list at all... Which might be a compliment. [Page Six]
• Hollywood Hills neighbors of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are pissed that paparazzi cars are parking in their hood. [Page Six]
• Barbara Walters is traveling by private jet to 25 US cities to promote her memoir — and she's taking hair and makeup people from The View with her. But! She's paying for it all herself. [Rush & Molloy]
• Jay-Z at a show at NYC's Madison Square Garden: "This concert isn't endorsed by Obama, but it's time for a change." [Rush & Molloy]
• Jeremy Piven was seen having a "knock-down, all-out screaming match" with a brunette at a party. Ari Gold, is that you? [Rush & Molloy]
• The jury may deliver a verdict in the Uma Thurman stalking case today; we'll keep you posted. [TMZ]
• The bench warrant issued for Foxy Brown yesterday was due to a misunderstanding. Foxy is still free! [TMZ]
• Angela Kinsey, who plays Angela on The Office, gave birth to a baby girl, Isabel Ruby, on Saturday afternoon. [People]
• Mischa Barton is pissed at a photographer who snapped pictures of her sunbathing topless. She says: "He's a ridiculous human being. I've never abhorred anyone more. I was so angry, I went up to him and said how disappointed I was with his behavior. He apologized but he was very insincere." It should be noted that this photographer is the same one Nicole Kidman won a restraining order against after she testified that he tried to run her off the road. [Mirror]
• Peaches Geldof, 19 (daughter of Sir Bob) is implicated in a cocaine ring, ruh-roh. [Mirror]
• Nip/Tuck star Joely Richardson kind of wants an African baby. "I'd love to adopt," she says. "I was almost in tears on a hospital visit because there were two or three babies to each cot, but I told myself that crying wouldn't help." [Mirror]
• Yoko Ono is suing the producers of a movie hat challenges the concept of Darwinian evolution, saying they used the song Imagine without her permission and led the blogosphere to accuse her of "selling out." [USA Today]
• "I don't think of myself as an [feminist] icon, but I think of myself as interested and can get ruffled at gender inequality. I still get touchy when people say that guys are interested in sex and girls are interested in love. It's bullshit." —Liz Phair. [Rolling Stone]

I'm asking for a comment dump! A misery playlist with your patheticmost songs, lyrics, and how they make you feel. I.e. the part of Mariah Carey's Shake It Off, where she goes "Hold up, my phone's breakin up, lemme hang up and call the machine right back" was consistently for a good three months the sole source of mirth in my life; a moment of dumbass levity in the midst of a sea of songs about dead boyfriends and the tears of a clown.