They Make Your Guest Idolator Feel Cool. And Hey, You Met Him. He Is <i>Not</i> Cool.

Happy Friday the 13th from today’s surrogate blogger, Chris “dennisobell” Molanphy: longtime commenter, second-time guest editor. Anything you need to know about me background-wise is still here, in my early-May introduction, for your delectation. If anything, the geekiness has only deepened since then.

In the two months since my first daylong gig here, we–the Idolator-majordomos and I–have launched the “Canon Fodder” column to a kind reception from you, the reading public. Lester Bangs was right–tell your editors you’re cooking up “a thinkpiece,” and they’ll eat it up with a spoon. Anyway, as a result of this brilliant idea we concocted, I’ve spent the early part of my summer digging out dusty copies of any magazine I can find with a “XXX Greatest Albums” list and poring through them like the Dead Sea Scrolls–trying to figure out, mathematically, the inverse overratedness-to-underratedness ratio of, say, Pink Floyd to Joy Division. I have yet to find the list that gives Kelly Clarkson her due, but mark my words, when I find it, the Idolator faithful will be the first to know.

And that, I promise, will be the last thing you read here today about Clive Davis’s fugitive unit-shifter, at least by my hand. Come Monday, you’re on your own again.