From Isaac Hayes’ breakthrough 1969 album, Hot Buttered Soul, which remains one of the great achievements in American pop music.  If you only know him as Chef from South Park, you owe it to yourselves to give his music a listen.  If you already know his catalog backwards and forwards, you owe it to yourself to listen again.

He will be missed.

Yes, George Carlin has died of heart failure. He was 71.

Check out his Times write-up here. It does a better job of summing up his illustrious career than a chump like me ever could.

I had the pleasure of seeing George Carlin live once — he came to Yale to give a talk; it was billed as something between a lecture and a stand-up set. This was about six, maybe seven years ago.

He also ennumerated his moral and religious beliefs (not many of the latter, Mr. Carlin was none too fond of religion). He spent a fair amount of time on a bit I’ve heard since — reducing the ten commandments to two. I remember what he said, and in lieu of a review of his amazing career here (he hardly needs a guy like me to praise him) I’ll list those two commandments as I still remember them, and a few other remarks on his remarkable legacy, after the jump…

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Overthinking It bids a fond farewell to Robert Rauschenberg, who passed away last Monday at the age of 82.

Honestly, his stuff isn’t so much to my taste. But there’s no denying that he was an important guy. You’ve got to imagine that overthinkingit’s de jure favorite artist/mancrush/obscure object of desire/fetish object Matthew Barney’s style would have been a lot different if Rauschenberg hadn’t cranked out this bad boy

in 1959.

BY THE WAY

One of Rauschenberg’s main teachers was Josef Albers, whose paintings mostly look like this.

Which just goes to show: either Rauschenberg paid NO damn attention in class, or Albers couldn’t teach.

Recently, I visited a Subway restaurant near where I work. I had been looking forward to a meatball sub. But instead, my stomach was filled only with sadness.

Hearty Italian, my favorite bread, has been discontinued.

Obviously, I’m a very egotistical person, because I had assumed Hearty Italian was the most popular bread of all. Turns out, not so much. It has now been replaced with Garlic Bread. C’mon, Subway! Who wants a sandwich on Garlic Bread? (Answer: More people than want a sandwich on Hearty Italian.)

Anyway, I got the sandwich on Regular Old Plain Italian, and it sucked.

Farewell, Hearty Italian. Now, God gets to eat you.