“Old Lang Syne,” this will never be. It doesn’t have the required sentimentality. No, U2′s “New Year’s Day” is a political song, but a special one in that — like the best political songs — it started out as a love song

This album is a musical security blanket of sorts. Actually, that’s how I feel about Greg Brown’s music in general, even the really ugly stuff. Oh yes, there is ugly stuff.

< >> *** STEELY DAN SUNDAY INDEX *** “Don’t Take Me Alive” is one of last of Steely Dan’s songs that’s truly “rock,” and the narrator’s portrayal as a deranged killer daring the cops to take him out also makes it one of Becker and Fagen’s least ambiguous songs.

I hear a good melody and I am hooked — the kind of thing that sounds like it is crawling over and through the nooks and crannies of the music as if a centipede is making its way through the busy forest undergrowth.