"In the wake of Modern Guilt and The Information, Beck’s latest album comes in an almost-forgotten form..."

"... twenty songs existing only as individual pieces of sheet music, never before released or recorded."

Sweet. People used to play their own music. Back in the 1930s, my mother bought sheet music. That was how the hit songs were purchased back then. I have a box of those old songs in my hall closet. But things are different today: Beck is inviting people to record these songs, and he's working with McSweeney's to make (some of) our versions of his songs available on line.

"And if the elevator tries to bring you down/Go crazy (Punch a higher floor!)."

Prince lyric, which just occurred to me in the context of the feminist-in-the-elevator-at-the-atheist-convention incident. Prince was telling us to live now, because we're all going to die, which he sometimes said clearly — "You better live now/Before the grim reaper come knocking on your door" — and sometimes said absurdly — "Let's look for the purple banana/Until they put us in the truck." He also expressed a clear belief in the afterlife. ("In this life/Things are much harder than in the afterworld/In this life/You're on your own.") He's no atheist. How he behaves in an actual in-this-life elevator, as opposed to a metaphorical elevator, I have no idea. I bet he silently occupies his corner and avoids eye contact, in classic elevator etiquette, and waits for his floor.

Sorry I can't link to a Prince "Let's Go Crazy" video. Prince is super-possessive about his songs and doesn't appreciate the value of letting people like Althouse win him new fans. So here's 1. Beck, "Elevator Music" and 2. Eminem, "Elevator." Beck says:

All the dudes with banjos
Chicks with wicks
Animals with bananas...

Eminem says:

That’s a no no who even she knows dada’s f-cking crazy
Fucking animal, cookoo, bananas, fucking AP

Whether those are purple bananas, I don't know.

ADDED: Actually, for now, at least, here's Prince, "Let's Go Crazy."

AND: For the sake of completeness, there is at least one more elevator/banana song.