Not all sprawl is equal.

Behind the African-American exodus of Detroit.

I'll have a short stack and an Ow-mlette.

The Paincakes (whose hilarious Danzig X-mas cover was in that previous Suburban Sprawl post, are worth taking a listen to if you like grindy punk rawk. Which I do.

(One lesson I learned from being a rock writer: Always remember to say in clear terms if you like something. The number of times I had to say, "But that was a compliment!")

Christmas… Christmas time…

I've loved Suburban Sprawl for a long time now, and one of my facebook pals (hi Sara!) just linked to their massive trove of X-mas music. My favorite comp is still the Ze Records one which I have as a murky dub of overplayed vinyl (that somehow makes the Suicide track just that much more crushing), but I'm really digging SubSounds' eight years of collected fun. The High Strung are particularly good this year, and there's a pretty great Wendy and Carl track down the page further.