Audio Johnapedia 7

0:40--The Cardinals standing pat at the trade deadline
2:20--Why some fans dislike John Mozeliak
3:50--The opposite personalities of Whitey Herzog and Tony LaRussa and how it applies to Mozeliak
5:50--The significance/insignificance of the Yadier Molina injury
8:45--Why it's both fair and necessary to question Mike Matheny on the Molina injury
11:00--Why Mike Matheny was destined to have a share of blind loyalists
14:05--Jon Jay is batting leadoff for some reason
15:55--My pick for Cardinals leadoff hitter when Matt Carpenter is sitting
18:05--What defines a fair weather sports fan
21:10--The new Pro Bowl rules and why the NFL is doing what they're doing
23:55--A better idea of how to spend the Super Bowl bye week than the Pro Bowl
24:50--Riley Cooper and his punishment level
25:50--A few words in defense of Kenny Chesney's role in this
28:05--Why do people do stupid things when there's a camera around?
29:00--Bad times for University of Florida football

Audio Johnapedia 6

0:50--Lance Lynn is really good whether "you people" will admit it or not
4:30--Cliff Lee trade rumors are dumb and the Cardinals don't/shouldn't want him
9:30--The Rzepczynski trade and what we got/didn't get
11:45--The merciful end of the Jon Jay errorless streak
15:55--Why Jadeveon Clowney as the world's best football player is a reasonable stance

Audio Johnapedia 5

0:25--Is anybody actually freaking out about the Cardinals?
1:35--The latest Cardinals/White Sox trade rumor and why it's not happening
7:00--David Ortiz and the punishment he should face
11:05--Fox Sports 1 and its too-bland-to-succeed strategy
18:25--USA wins the Gold Cup and the joy of American underdogs
22:50--Listener results for "What would be your walkup song?" question

ThinkProgress on Fox Sports 1

Audio Johnapedia 4

2:55--Shane Robinson and Jon Jay batting second

9:10--The divisiveness of Lance Lynn

14:45--The benefits of Twitter for baseball players

19:30--A few words in defense of Alex Rodriguez

23:00--The hilarity of the Yankees, among others, in free agency

26:35--Baseball walkup songs: What would yours be?

Audio Johnapedia 3

2:20--The Scrabble promotion
6:35--The Rasmus trade in retrospect
13:25--Comparing Molina/Carpenter/Craig to the Real MV3
19:45--Rams opening training camp and dealing with optimism
23:05--The Greatest Show on Turf Part 2? (no)
25:15--Mizzou football and the power of reasonable expectations
29:40--Aaron Hernandez, the Florida Gators, and Truman State athletics

I'm still going to be using Soundcloud for now. Will continue my search for a full-time audio hosting location. Or I might quit. TBD. Thanks again for listening and for comments/criticisms.

CORRECTION: I stated that six people, including the gunman, were killed during the 2008 Kirkwood City Hall massacre. The total, including the gunman, is actually seven.

Audio Johnapedia 2

1:45 Carlos Martinez for Alexei Ramirez trade rumors

6:25 A.J. McCarron, Johnny Manziel, and how the media treats the two

12:40 Jadeveon Clowney and concussions in football

19:45 Aaron Hernandez and the role of Bill Belichick in the murder investigation

24:20 "Blurred Lines" as the Song of Summer 2013 and sexism in popular music

Drew Magary's article on the role of coaches

Big ups to those on Twitter who suggested I use SoundCloud. This could be the way this rolls. Thanks for listening once again! All feedback is welcome and encouraged.

Audio Johnapedia!

I am thrilled to announce (via post) the beginning of a new chapter (maybe?) in Johnapedia history--audio! Posted above is the first edition of Audio Johnapedia (I may come up with a more spiffy name, but for now I'll stick to that). In Audio Johnapedia I, I cover three major topics--Ryan Braun and steroids in baseball, the Cardinals bullpen, and the royal baby and why I don't care about it. I certainly appreciate all listens as well as any constructive criticism (note: I prefer constructive but if you can't do that, just swearing at me about how I suck is also allowed). Enjoy!

I'll throw you guys a bone if you don't want to listen to the whole thing (it's long, life is busy, I don't blame you) but want to hear my voice (understandable)--I begin talking about Ryan Braun at roughly 1:40, bullpen talk at roughly the 22 minute mark, and the royal baby at 34:45.

John's Hatesong--Stairway To Heaven

NOTE: I got this idea from the excellent AV Club series "Hatesong", in which comedians and musicians are asked about their least favorite song and why they hate it. In this blog post, I cover my least favorite song--Led Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven."

Led Zeppelin is a great band. Not a good band, a great band. But "Stairway to Heaven" is an unconscionable pile of dogshit. Worse bands at least have the decency to keep their horrible songs under five minutes--Led Zeppelin cursed mediocre AOR stations for eternity with an eight minute song which is only popular because it's "poetic" by standards of the stoner metal crowd. Holy shit, "Stairway to Heaven" is the worst.

Essentially, "Stairway" is two songs. The first song is pretentious and boring. The second song has a generic yet beloved guitar solo followed by half-assed Robert Plant screams. "Free Bird" basically follows the same formula of slow song followed by fast song, but at least 1. The slow song has something musically interesting about it even if it's not great; 2. The guitar solo is tremendous.

The worst thing about "Stairway to Heaven" is that it's a fucking abysmal taint on an otherwise great album, Led Zeppelin IV. There's the pure protopunk roar of "Rock and Roll", the fun sexuality of "Black Dog", and best of all, the album has the truly epic hard rock brilliance of "When The Levee Breaks", which is probably one of the 25 or so greatest songs in the history of rock. It is an awesome way to end the album, and yet it is the song which ends Side One that lives in history and tops lists of the greatest rock songs. These lists are consistently terrible so this shouldn't be considered a major surprise. Rolling Stone, for instance, says the best Stones song is "Satisfaction" is better than "Sympathy for the Devil." But at least "Satisfaction" is a satisfying song on a dumb-rock level. "Stairway to Heaven" doesn't even do that.

The best way I can know for sure, however, that "Stairway to Heaven" is a terrible song is that even Led Zeppelin doesn't like it. Well, Robert Plant doesn't like it. As a general rule of thumb, fans side with the guitarist in bands in which a singer and guitarist dominate the spotlight (Richards over Jagger, Perry over Tyler, Townshend over Daltrey, Young over Scott/Johnson, and so on into infinity), and it seems like Jimmy Page likes the song just fine. But Robert Plant hated "Stairway" so much that he once pledged to a public radio station in Portland under the promise that they would never play the song. And this is from a guy who WROTE the song.

"And she's buying a stairway to heaven" is a stupid lyric. I have read countless interpretations of what this means and none of them make sense. Not one. But it sure does sound deep! It's about consumerism and it's about spirituality and--no it isn't. It's a random assembly of words. Which I don't mind--LZ had plenty of great, dumb rock songs. But "Stairway to Heaven" isn't a rock song. It's slow and plodding pseudo-folk that Bob Dylan had done countless times in the 60s, but Dylan at least had the decency to throw in lyrics about transients or racial harmony or something. I'm not a Bob Dylan fan but he at least did that much.

When I tried to upload Mothership onto my computer, there was a read error at the end of Disc 1 and it cut off "Stairway to Heaven" after about twenty seconds on my iTunes. God was looking over me that day, folks. Yes He was.