​Spurred on by the realization that both David Bowie's commercial breakthrough Let's Dance and Queen's News of the World had solid, sturdy side ones on their vinyl releases, I then began the hunt for other great vinyl slabs with amazing side ones.

Of course, the idea is that this could only include albums from the (first) great rock vinyl heyday. I am sure that Wilco and others have turned in great side ones in the past decade, but only a select few of you have heard them on vinyl.

The secret to great albums, of course, has everything to do with genius and gripping songs, plus proper sequencing and editing. And you may remember a few years back, when I attempted to cut some of most popular double slabs down to one lean collection.

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​It started as a simple question: What albums would you leave your unborn children, if you knew you were on borrowed time and may not be around to show them the way. At first I asked for albums for sons, but then it grew broader, not out of needing to pacify the PC-thug in me, but to make sure everyone, regardless of gender, had a sort of Rosetta Stone of musical history in their hands.

You could leave them pristine vinyl versions of these, a collection of cassettes, or maybe just a diamond-covered flash drive, if are so inclined. As for me, I will also leave my unborn child my Rdio account. That's not a paid endorsement, that's just me being expedient.

To get some obvious picks out of the way, the entire Beatles catalog will come standard with being my child, like seat-belts in cars. As will George Strait's Strait Out Of The Box, and ZZ Top's catalog.

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Metal Bad Boy Kim Jong-il

​Kim Jong-il and '80s hair metal were almost synonymous, and last night when the world found out that the North Korean leader passed on to the big rock show in the sky, all I could listen to was hair ballads, driving through the city in tears. Looking at things he would never get to look at through my tear-stricken eyes.

The swagger, the passion, the cult of personality, the virile way he lead his people, his fans, just like Axl Rose on the Use Your Illusion tour, or at the very least, the late Jani Lane at a record signing after "Cherry Pie" came out. The Dear Leader had charisma for days, the wardrobe, the mythology - he invented the hamburger after all - and the adoration of millions and millions in his home country.

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Paul Simon dressed as a turkey on Saturday Night Live in 1976. Duh.

​Today Paul Simon, acclaimed solo artist and the much shorter half of Simon & Garfunkel, turns 70 years old. The singer, who just released So Beautiful or So What back in April, has been a key link in bringing African and island sounds to American pop ears with his solo work. With S&G he helped craft some of most timeless folk-pop that still manages to influence to this day. Just take a listen to "The Boxer" or "America".

Any Paul Simon education must begin with his first three solo albums after S&G, Paul Simon, There Goes Rhymin' Simon, and Still Crazy After All These Years all hold treasures beyond singles like "Kodachrome," "50 Ways to Leave Your Lover," and "Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard." Check out that hipster mugshot on the cover of his 1972 self-titled slab.

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​This weekend, I am heading back to Pearland for my 10-year high school reunion. It's funny, I say "going back" like I wasn't there on Sunday sitting on my parents' couch watching cable and letting them feed me mashed potatoes and slip me gas money. This trip is different, though, because I will be participating in one of the strangest and endearing rituals in modern history, the class reunion.

It's to be a weekend-long affair out in the suburbs. Friday night we are all going to the high school football game, my first in a decade, and then convene back at a classmate's bar for a mixer, which means heavy drinking and hard posing. The next day is the family picnic, and since I have no children or pets - save my girlfriend's scruffy Maltese - it looks like I can sit that one out and sleep until one in the afternoon.

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Punk Rock Elite

​This Friday would have been Z.Z. Hill's 76th birthday, but the popular Texas bluesman passed away in 1984 from a heart attack. Most people only know who the late soul crooner is through his connection to ZZ Top. The moniker of that little ol' band from where we are sitting right now is a reference to Hill, and the "Top" is a nod to B.B. King being on "top."

So of course this week for Craig's Hlist - which was on a vacation while we dealt with ACL and BestFest - digs into other bands named after real people. Repeat: Real people, outside the band itself. No fictional characters, though thinking about Mr. T as a "real" person hurts our head.

For instance, the name Fleetwood Mac comes from band members Mick Fleetwood and John McVie, so they don't work. Fun fact: Danzig is named after Glenn Danzig.

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​It works like this: when it's hot out in Houston, we fantasize about freezing weather, parkas, knit caps, and cuddling up in bed with someone warm. When it's cold, really cold, for those few scattered days all we want to do is sit on a patio in shorts, sip margaritas and look at all the bare skin walking by.

Now, it's been at least a thousand degrees in Houston for the past, what, three months? (Rocks Off checked with all the local weather sites, we promise.) Buildings are melting like ice cream, dogs and other small pets are literally evaporating into the sidewalks, and sweat hugs your body like a slippery loved one.

It's hot, Houston, but that don't mean we can't make it a shivery winter wonderland in our heads.

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photoshoplooter.tumblr.com/

​A few days ago, in the midst of the worst of the rioting going on around London, which has now dominated the headlines for the better part of a week, someone on Twitter remarked "If Americans rioted every time the cops shot somebody we'd have no time for cocaine and jerking off."

That made Rocks Off snicker, but it was also a sadly true statement, aside from the coke and onanism. Substitute Subway and So You Think You Can Dance for those two on this side of the pond and you see what he means.

The shooting of reported London criminal Mark Duggan at the hands of undercover police in Tottenham is at the center of it all. Watchdogs and early forensic tests are stating that Duggan didn't fire on police. His death brought violence and mayhem on the British capital that hasn't been seen in decades.

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"My ride's here."

​Rocks Off has never died, it's true. Though we sometimes find ourselves dying in small doses day to day when we spy an old man clip his toenails in the nude at the gym, or we open up a dozen emails from record label PR folk touting a five-date national tour.

Living humans are obsessed with dead humans, and our own deaths are built up in our heads to be these grand, painless things, full of friends and family surrounding us in a bed, as we drift off into...well, we have never died so we aren't too sure what happens.

Being huge, monstrous music fans, like you no doubt are if you are reading Rocks Off, you may have thought about the perfect music to soundtrack your final few minutes here on Earth. When Joey Ramone was saying his farewells to the world in April 2001, he was listening to U2's "In a Little While," from All That You Can't Leave Behind, released the year before.

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AC/DC: The Only Four-Letter Band That Matters

​The other day while we were tooling around with a collection of music we had inherited from some family members that had passed away, we realized that of all the compact discs that we had in the box, the Miles Davis, the Ravi Shankar box set, the Thelonious Monk, the thing we were playing loudest was ABBA's greatest hits.

This was also the same shameful night when we grabbed the Beach Boys collection out of the crate and played "Kokomo" before we even could get to "In My Room." There is a moral to that story somewhere, but we think we really wanted to get that down on record, in case someone ever tries to claim we only listen to obscure bullshit.

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