iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 20m

A certain kind of person remembers a day when one just referred to this band in shorthand as TFUL282. Heartwarming to see them back out!

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

This is poignant but also makes me worry that David Attenborough is going to be eaten by his dog.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Springsteen & Morello singing the Clash after Bruce and Baez sang Dylan. Now that's a goddamn transition. #powertothepeople

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Will the retro vibes of Miranda Lambert's new album Crisco benefit by her link to "Choosin' Texas"? Either way, it's outraging that the current, streaming-based opening for women in country could not have come when this queen was at her commercial peak. Me today in Slate. slate.com/culture/2026...

slate.com

She Co-Wrote the Longest-Running No. 1 of All Time. Now Will She Finally Get Her Due?

Country women are taking over the pop charts. But is there room for the godmother of them all?

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

RIP to the greatest, champion of champions, who sang for the underbirds. youtu.be/u6k9U6vQ8Mk?...

youtu.be

Capitalism Gone Mad

YouTube video by Mighty Sparrow - Topic

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Today in "Crrritic!" (now with one more R!): John Lydon got his groove back! And thoughts on Angine de Poitrine's Polaris, Ed Sheeran's shite, etc. carlwilson.substack.com/p/they-put-a...

carlwilson.substack.com

They put a hot wire to my head

PiL in Toronto, Angine de Poitrine in Polaris, Ed Sheeran in perdition, Taylor Swift, and other things on which I could be wrong, I could be right

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

Marissa's Rolling Stone piece made clear she knew why you may not have heard "Choosin' Texas," 2026's biggest hit. Her question was, why be aggressively *proud of it? Sadly, she overstated it in that out-of-context quote. But all the over-the-top/"country sucks" reactions mostly support her point.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Travis & Taylor are lucky the prospects of a marriage aren't determined by how good the love songs about it are. But there are also some bright spots among Swift's new Showgirl "encores." slate.com/culture/2026...

slate.com

Unfortunately, All of Taylor Swift’s Songs About Travis Kelce Continue to Be Terrible

Taylor Swift’s new songs promise on Encore, but they’re really a bunch of repeats.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

Angine de Poitrine takes the @polarismusicprize.bsky.social - welcome to the Polaris's new "inevitable winner wins" era with the new voting system. I have mixed feelings about that, which I'll write about soon, but meanwhile, félicitations aux musiciens anonymes du Saguenay!

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Netanyahu and Trump today both on their classic authoritarian censorship $#IT, attacking journalism and free speech.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

After initially being unavailable, Angine de Poitrine has been added to the bill at the Polaris Prize Gala a week in advance - which strongly suggests they're going to win. (In the past they couldn't know the winner in advance because the jury met during the ceremony, but that's changed this year.)

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

IT.IS.ON. Don't buy Starbucks until the busters are busted!

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

This Portlandia sketch is a time capsule from a lost (or rapidly vanishing) world where adults read all the time and discussed what they read. How many of the publications they mention still exist? 15 years ago it was silly parody, now it's a poignant elegy. youtu.be/6JLWQEuz2gA?...

youtu.be

Portlandia Did You Read It?

YouTube video by senatorface

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Chris Piuma @wordgarbler.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

Lots of great songs here, but I am especially glad that Jenny Toomey's take on Cheat made the list. So good.

youtu.be

Cheat

YouTube video by Jenny Toomey - Topic

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

Free to embroider on your front-hall sampler or emblazon on your book club T-shirt: THROW CAUTION TO THE WINE.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

I proposed to friends that "Jolene" was unique in pop history as a woman-led love-triangle song pervaded by an erotic pull towards the rival. We all tried to prove me wrong. The result is a three-hour "Jolene's Stepchildren" playlist, today in "Crritic." carlwilson.substack.com/p/listening-...

carlwilson.substack.com

Listening to Jolene’s Stepchildren

One more Dolly-related playlist, before the moment passes

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

Seconding everything John says here. RIP.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

Special bandaid listings for just this week in Toronto-area shows, today on "Crritic!" (rest of month to follow as I work the kinks out of a new format to provide more links etc.) carlwilson.substack.com/p/lust-for-l...

carlwilson.substack.com

Lust for Live, through Labour Day weekend

Toronto-area show listings for the first week of September

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Michael Rancic @therewasnosound.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

I hope they sue the pants off of them! but I also want to caution musicians that you will be sorely disappointed if the problems with gen AI are only challenged on the grounds of intellectual property.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

The mail-in-ballot list policy is a Trojan horse for large-scale disenfranchisement. It won't be the last.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

It would be hard to overstate how much this is exactly the anthem that I needed this week (BMO in my case rather than RBC, but otherwise dead-on)... Also fun that Americans won't understand about half of this!

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Marc Masters 🌵 @marcissist.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

RIP David Fair. What an inspiration. He and Jad pretty much invented DIY indie. youtu.be/kt1At1Fq8dE?...

youtu.be

David & Jad Fair from Half Japanese explain how to play guitar

YouTube video by Stormy Weathers

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

The news we need this weekend. Go Olivia go!!!

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WBB - Cernunnos @renmccormacksghost.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

The American influencers who have been ignorantly cheering on Doug Ford have more than a quarter of their replies made up of people from Ontario educating them about Doug Ford & how very awful he is. Yet none of them acknowledge this. We spent the time researching your asshole Trump , return favour

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

My @slate.com colleague @lauramille.bsky.social expertly eviscerates Netflix's The Whisper Man, which inexplicably corrals an all-star cast into a serial-killer plot as predictable as it is nonsensical. Read it instead of watching it! slate.com/culture/2026...

slate.com

A Bestselling Book Is Now a Star-Studded Netflix Movie. To Be Blunt: It’s Bad.

Just about every worn-out cliché known to the serial-killer thriller genre gets trotted out in The Whisper Man.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

Today in "Crritic!", an annotated guide to my Down 'n' Dirty Dolly playlist, in memoriam. Plus a side-trip into John Oswald's 1988 Plunderphonic time-warp of her version of "The Great Pretender," transformed into "a vortex of androgyny." carlwilson.substack.com/p/saint-doll...

carlwilson.substack.com

Dolly Parton, the original Material Girl

Bonus notes and links for my Down ‘n’ Dirty Dolly playlist

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Reposted by Carl Wilson

The New Republic @newrepublic.com · 26/08/2026

The future of Parton’s Imagination Library has become uncertain due to the quiet machinations of Republicans in the Midwest that have sought to unravel public funding for the cause. trib.al/Z9f1GpD

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

Natalie and I pursued some similar side-paths in our mental journeys through Dollywood today.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

I wrote about loving the messy, melodramatic, trashy trickster, come-on artist Dolly more than the Saint Dolly of recent imaginings - and made a playlist to match. slate.com/culture/2026...

slate.com

What We Miss When We Reduce Dolly Parton to a Saint

The queen of country was a much weirder—and more wonderful—figure than the recent flattening of her suggests.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

I wish I could feel confident Carney was not going to go along with this.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

OK, changed my mind for multiple reasons, including that the line "I'm not good, but I'm better" is the exact right level of hope for 2026.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

How long a nap did HRC just wake up from?

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

RFK is like, "Don't stop until they have the right to get polio too!"

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

Nothing's changed since effing Judy Garland. Pissed off on Hayden Panettiere's behalf, RIP. (The below is from Variety.)

Variety: "As Panettiere told People, when she was only 15, someone on her team began plying her with “happy pills” before she walked red carpets. “They were to make me peppy during interviews,” Panettiere said. “I had no idea that this was not an appropriate thing, or what door that would open for me when it came to my addiction… As I got older, the drugs and alcohol became something I almost couldn’t live without.”

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

TIL that in 1999 Jethro Tull put out an album called J Tull Dot Com.

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staring blankly into the abyss @irmsby.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

This is the best thing I've read about Phoebe Bridgers' excellent new album. Worth a read whether you're a fan or not.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

I didn't encounter Dave Marsh's writing when I was younger - I wasn't a Rolling Stone person - but he affected many other writers who shaped me in turn, many who are now friends. I've come to see that his deeply humanistic intelligence reached me second hand (and his missteps too). Rest in peace.

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Ann Powers @annkpowers.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

a lovely and astute analysis with some lightbulb-igniting thoughts about gender and the voice

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

"I Can't Wait" is good, and the video (Phoebe's on the housefly trend alongside Tom Waits). But wouldn't have been my choice of next single - "Haunted" was my first impulse while listening. Was it the Cameron Winter factor? youtu.be/hU-gnl8WLP0?...

youtu.be

Phoebe Bridgers - I Can't Wait (Official Video)

YouTube video by Phoebe Bridgers

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

Random Phoebe Bridgers questions that didn't fit into my review - is she for some reason referencing this instrumental from the Leonard Bernstein version of Candide? (I do know what the Governor's Ball is, don't at me, just thinking layers.) open.spotify.com/track/5zW7nx...

open.spotify.com

Governor's Waltz

Leonard Bernstein, Stephen Sondheim, New York City Opera Chorus and Orchestra, John Mauceri · Leonard Bernstein: Candide (Opera House) · Song · 1986

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

The followup to my favourite record of the decade, Phoebe Bridgers' Lost Weekend re-invents her relation to the "feminine" voice, mourning, fame, storytelling, and survival. Today in Slate. Hat-tips to @laurenelkin.bsky.social and Anne Carson. slate.com/culture/2026...

slate.com

Her Last Album Has Become One of the Defining Records of the Decade. Her New One Is Something Else Altogether.

On her first solo record in six years, Phoebe Bridgers confronts grief, new love, and sudden fame.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

If you're up listening to #Phoebe tonight, my @slate.com essay's just dropped, about the way this album navigates her changing relationship to fans, fame, songwriting, and in particular her voice as feminine performance. slate.com/culture/2026...

slate.com

She’s Gone From Indie Rocker to Unlikely Pop Star. Now She’s Back With Her First Album Since the Big Change.

On her first solo record in six years, Phoebe Bridgers confronts grief, new love, and sudden fame.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

The portion of these I've seen (about a quarter) include some of my very faves - Bunheads, Crashing, Dead Like Me, Lodge 49, We Are Lady Parts. So that seems like a strong sign to use the rest as a late-summer watch list. Love that it's all written by one critic rather than by committee, too!

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

In the name of competitiveness, this government is gutting environmental protection. Promoting the Canadian economy doesn't mean just doing whatever business wants and damn the consequences. Unless of course you're a banker.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 09/08/2026

Little, Big was a totemic novel to my friend group in late high school.

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Carl Wilson @carlzoilus.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

I'm on CBC's Commotion this morning talking about that old construct, "song of the summer." It's "Choosing Texas" ofc, but what else? Why so many of the contenders are gloomy, but why that's maybe a hopeful thing for commiseration and solidarity! 11 a.m. in most time zones or later on the podcast

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