Allow me to direct you to Charles' post about our new favorite weekday morning music video act, Coheed & Cambria. They've been around for a while, I guess, but this is my first encounter with them. "The Suffering" is a genuinely great metallish pop song, but the rest of the album seems pretty lackluster. Still, check out Charles' recounting of their backstory. These guys don't make concept albums — they're a concept band. When their lyrics say "until the stars go out", it's meant literally — the stars going out is a plot point in their bizarre scifi epic.

I'm sure it will end with one or more band members on a rooftop screaming at the assembled police below, but at the moment their multimedia spectacle is pretty damn entertaining — even if most of the music isn't.

ALSO: speaking of good pop songs embedded in otherwise regrettable albums, I heard Liz Phair's "Why Can't I" over a box-store PA last weekend, and you know what? It's a pretty good song. We were all too busy (justifiably) yelling "Judas!" when it came out to notice. But if Kelly Clarkson had released that track, we'd all have revelled in its ironic catchiness.

UPDATE: A dozen or so listens later, "The Suffering" is still pretty great. You can listen to it here. But listen to it on a decent set of headphones — there's a surprising number of backing vocal lines that are easy to miss.