Their case is fuzzy and circumstantial

Alright, I’ll admit it, I’m hooked on Veronica Mars. What a great show. Clever, tricky, fun, quirky. It’s like Buffy combined with Nancy Drew combined with The OC combined with Twin Peaks. I’m halfway through the first season and very anxious to discover the answer to some of the mysteries.

And, like many new shows, it’s also a vehicle for some great music. From references to Snow Patrol to a little bit of “Slow Hands” by Interpol over a flashback to a scene where a character tries to pass off the lyrics to “When the Angels Sing” (possibly my favorite Social Distortion song) as his own original poetry, there’s a lot of good stuff.

Here are a few songs that feature in the episodes I’ve seen or on the soundtrack.

When the Angels Sing – Social Distortion
Long Time Coming – The Delays
Fireflies – Amy Cook
Weak Become Heroes – The Streets

And, just in case you needed yet another pop culture experience with Ben and Jimmy, one of the early episodes includes Veronica and Troy talking about Such Great Heights (no download because, let’s face it, if you don’t already have this song or can’t figure out how to find it, you’ve probably been living on Tethys, the third moon of Saturn, for the last 4 years).

Around the blogosphere: The Smudge of Ashen Fluff has some songs by Heartache With Hard Work favorites The Submarines from their performance on KCRW.

Also, a number of folks have posted about Ted Stevens’ brilliant comments on net neutrality. Head over to Another Form of Relief to read about it and listen to a techno remix of Stevens’ remarks. Or you can stay right here to check out the Daily Show take on it.

On a more serious note: things are looking worse and worse in the Middle East. I’m not going to get into it here, but if you want to understand what it might be like in Lebanon right now, or if you simply want to read a truly beautiful book, I would recommend Beirut Fragments by Jean Said Makdisi (the sister of Edward Said, for those who care about that sort of thing). It’s one of my favorite books, and seems more appropriate than ever this week.