Mic check! MIC CHECK! Okay, thanks. Listen up, everybody, this is like the worst thing since Modest Mouse got on the radio. Kurt Vile has sold out. I’m not just talking a commercial for some Bono charity or a restaurant chain; this is the big one–a bank! Bank of America! Hasn’t he been watching Jeff Mangum? We know who our enemies are, Kurt! We know who our enemies are–not our NMEs, totally different–and Bank of America is so our enemy!

Last week, Patrick Stickles, frontman for New Jersey punk rockers Titus Andronicus, called out Philadelphia neo-folkie Kurt Vile on Twitter for licensing his song “Baby’s Arms” to Bank of America, which used it in a TV commercial.

Over the course of two tweets, Stickles wrote, “Come on, Kurt Vile, yr a million times better than that. #crushcapitalism If it is even true! Can someone confirm? if it is real, then you need to get real, man. I thought you were, like, the best dude in music!”

Vile responded in defense of himself, tweeting, among other things, “sorry titus. i did it to be like the carpenters.and to buy my daughter high end diapers. and to pay back my publishing advance. and because i never cared about that sorta thing. whoops,i even have a bank of america account.” (all tweets are sic’d.)

What? Kurt didn’t even roll over and apologize! What is that crap? Even his manager had the gall to try and play this off as some sort of freedom of thought issue or whatever:

KV has never used his music as a political platform. He’s not Fugazi. He’s a songwriter who’s worked for a decade to make a living off of his work. Where does this ever end? No selling records to Republicans? Tea Partiers blocked from downloading singles from iTunes?

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A lot has happened in fourteen days — since Friday, the 24th of April — when the wires started buzzing 24/7 about the “Swine Flu.”

Oh wait, my bad. Now it’s the much more politically correct, H1N1 (Dems can’t offend the porcine population, they might need Porky Pig or pro-choice Miss Piggy to vote in 2010 and 2012).

In the meanwhile, a lot of stories haven’t been covered nearly enough outside of blogs and Fox News. Oddly, the vast majority of these stories seem to be things Obama God, Jr. wants to keep quiet. Here’s a not so exhaustive list: (more…)