“Vinyl is dead!” they say. Fortunately, “they” don’t know what “they” are talking about. Vinyl’s just been more underground and less suburban where the Top 40 crowd just thinks it’s dead. After all, if it’s not being played on the radio or seen on MTV, why should they pay attention, right? A fat, big-tongued Dreaded raspberry goes to all of those people.

What vinyl offers is that nifty crackling sound; it says your music is alive and not some antiseptic, digitized waves. Besides, aren’t you more compelled to save a skipping record than a skipping CD? Plus, the lack of portability means that it’s less possible for you to listen to the music three minutes at a time. Imagine: actually taking time to stay in one place (relatively speaking) and actually listen to the music as a whole chunk. What a concept! What a luxury!

More and more artists have been releasing their “albums” as actual albums as of late. Thus, it stands to reason that the concept of a 45 has remained as well. Now many record companies (ie: the big ones) are using the medium for advance releases. One such release is the upcoming project by ex-Pixies bassist, ex-Breeders guitarist/vocalist Kim Deal. Under the name The Amps, the advance single is called “Bragging Party.”

“Bragging Party” holds nothing exotic in its ways. It is 100% Kim Deal from the lofty, lo-fi vocals to the fiberglass slabs of music that float out of the speakers. This is reportedly a stop-gap project, intended to bide time between the Deal-rejected, unreleased Breeders album and the proverbial “something better.” Hopefully, The Amps will develop into a long-term thing. The single alone has the musical elements of Kim Deal that has managed to do what Frank Black hasn’t: keep loyal fans.

Another vinyl single is afoot this week, but seemingly more under the intention of seeming ultimately indie. Shat is a band from Chicago (and arguably the past tense of one of those words I can’t print without it being flanked by quotation marks). According to their press release, Shat is also a band of saucy, young guys barely out of puberty and “even younger than that shitty band Silverchair” (See, I told you about the quotes.). Unfortunately for Shat, three things are against them: A) “younger” doesn’t translate into “better;” B) that “shitty band Silverchair” (although I can’t stand them either) has a major record deal and is making disgustingly hi-yooge (ie: huge) amounts of money from it; and C) there are plenty of other bands who are better and aren’t even on a label.

Their single, “Quite the Whore,” moves somewhere between “that shitty band Silverchair” and punk, but mostly it’s your simple derivative stuff. Being derivative isn’t necessarily bad, but you should be good when you are. Otherwise, all the indie integrity and attitude isn’t going to get you anywhere. If you’re looking for integrity, look to Sonic Youth or Yo La Tengo, because tooting your own horn and ripping on other bands won’t do it. It would be best for Shat to quit touring, go back to school and get their stuff down before taking on the world.

Moving back to the small, plastic disc, World Domination Records found a great, self-effacing quirk in the New Jersey band Lizard Music. Imagine, if you will, Weezer with a little less rock. Then go back to a high school Talented and Gifted class where you have kids toying with convoluted run-on sentences. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain, and you’re kind of close to Lizard Music and their album Fashionably Lame (if you’re not confused).

The record has a strange aura about it. The sonic qualities are sort of like The Beatles’ White Album, when they were figuring out the stuff you could do with stereophonic recording. The lyrics are built on bases of non sequitur, internal and end rhyme and good old American know-how. These guys could easily have been the group sitting in the lunchroom, having conversations consisting entirely of private jokes. What’s scarier is that they could understand each other perfectly.

The thing about Lizard Music’s music is that it’s easier to hear it than describe it. So while the scientists are still trying to figure out why non-sequitur lyrics scream, “Intelligent!” while deep, thoughtful lyrics don’t, the Lizard Music guys are having fun making spitballs because they already know — and don’t care. Ah, yes, the cognitive luxuries of being gifted in a nation of idiots