Enough has been said the tragic and premature death of the finest modern folkie in years. Drugs, despair and success have taken yet another, but not before allowing him one last chance to put his sad pen to paper. The songs of “Basement” are often every bit as good as anything he has ever done: part rock anthem, part old-fashioned acoustic folk, part musical diary. What has always made Elliot Smith so good is ability to make even the most morbid songs seem uplifting and even hummable. With a sound as distinctive any in modern music, you can only wonder how long he would have been able to keep his songwriting fresh probing such a damaged soul. Unfortunately we won’t have that chance, but at least we have this one.

There is a kind of discomforting cool that spills from even the earliest scenes in Oldboy. This a revenge thriller cut from the same cloth as Tarrantino’s best films – a kind of scattered, disjointed, puzzle that starts from the moment a drunk man awakes from a stupor to find himself locked in an innocuous motel room where for fifteen years he lives on dumplings and television where he eventually sees that he had been accused of killing his own wife. When finally released back into the world without explanation, he seeks nothing but revenge for the years that were taken from him and the family that has disappeared. Somewhere between “Memento” and “Kill Bill” exists this graphic, psychological exploration into the minds of a hunter and victim. I would be surprised if there is a better film released this year.

I love bands from Akron, OH, partly I call Akron my childhood home, partly because I can only name two and I like them both (Devo, The Pretenders). This year’s Northern Ohio nomination is The Black Key’s deftly titled “Rubber factory.” The band is really Ohio’s answer to Detroit’s White Stripes: a two-piece blues-rock powerhouse, with a raw buzz saw guitar sound that could easily be mistaken for outtakes from an unrecorded Hendrix album. Although singer Dan Auerbach is just a young kid in his twenties his voice sounds more like one hastily recorded somewhere in the Miss. Delta. Long live rock and roll!