I am hopelessly addicted to nostalgia. In this I don’t think I’m that much different from the rest of the world. I dread growing older, I have a peculiar affinity for keeping useless junk that long ago grew thick with dust around in various drawers and desk corners, I refuse to throw away concert t-shirts from half a decade ago – in short, I don’t let go of the past easily. It’s a habit I’ve been trying to break, but few things make that harder than music. Listening to Elliott Smith reminds me of a hundred different things, from middle school to break ups, while the Stills remind me of the last summer before college and Cut Copy vividly recreates living in my fraternity house two years ago. Fountains of Wayne, meanwhile, conjures up my first year in high school, a time when I thought I was so fucking cool for listening to Welcome Interstate Managers before “Stacy’s Mom” hit the radio (I’m either the only person to do this or my memory of myself in high school is a lot more flattering than reality). Welcome Interstate Managers was one of the first legit power-pop records I’d ever listened to, and I could have done a lot worse. It’s FoW at their most wry, Chris Collingwood and Adam Schlesinger at the peak of their tongue-in-cheek lyrical powers and with sixteen killer hooks to boot. I bring all this up because, in the context of their follow-ups, 2007’s Traffic and Weather and now Sky Full of Holes, I feel like nostalgia has betrayed me once again.

“RIYL: getting reacquainted with your roots, music recorded in a church gymnasium, forging new ground while maintaining a distinct spirit.” The above is loosely taken from a Circuital press release. In related news, marketing is one of the worst professions around. Circuital would have you believe that it’s a reaffirmation of the My Morning Jacket of old, of stellar alt-country gems like At Dawn or Z’s soaring experimental psychedelia, but Circuital is more a weak-kneed reminder of My Morning Jacket’s potential. It’s sort of like looking back on one’s misspent youth and remembering things to be a helluva better than they actually were, or, alternatively, listening back to 2008′s Evil Urges and thinking those funky side trips were actually a good idea.

There’s something to be said about Ben Gibbard’s transformation from a Built to Spill-loving Northwestern weepie to indie rock’s poet laureate. Death Cab for Cutie, for all their splendid musicianship and Chris Walla’s knack for evolving their sound, have always been about Gibbard. Gibbard, bemoaning a meaningless relationship in “Tiny Vessels” or articulating that eternal feeling of moving on that “Photobooth” spoke to so clearly, always so straightforward with his lyrical bloodletting but talented with his knives.

As if there weren’t enough wedding movies hitting theaters this summer, we can now add a melodramatic foreign romance to the likes of “Something Borrowed,” “Bridesmaids” and “Jumping The Broom.” Enter “Bride Flight,” the most expensive Dutch film ever made. But apparently even a budget of 6.4 million euros couldn’t cover this film’s many shortcomings.

So you want to know about Bridesmaids? Let me put it this way: when was the last time you walked out of the theater buckling over with side splitting laughter? Haven’t done that since, when?…EVER?

In an interview with Pitchfork this past January, Antlers frontman Peter Silberman related something Frightened Rabbit’s Scott Hutchinson had told him about performing deeply personal material: “It’s the audience’s now. You’ll sing it to them, but they’re the ones singing it. You can let it go and give it to them.” It’s hard to imagine Silberman standing up night after night and going through Hospice’s litany of heartache, an album that was painful even for an uninterested listener, not to mention the guy who suffered through its creation.

Well, this is the fall 2011 collection from Marc by Marc Jacobs. It is a disgrace, pretty much like Joan Riverʼs last 23 surgeries. Please, do not waste your money on this. I love Marcʼs designs most of the time, but not now. Yuck…

David Schwimmer’s “Trust” humanizes a delicate topic that’s not often dwelled upon by filmmakers and screenwriters. The story of rape involving a minor and a seasoned sexual predator isn’t exactly the formula for a blockbuster hit. But although the severe subject matter may destine “Trust” for popularity in indie theaters, it’s definitely a film worth seeing.