If there’s one rule in music criticism, it’s that everyone loves a good story. As much as things should be about the music, they rarely are.

Ra Ra Riot has had a good couple weeks following the August 19 release of The Rhumb Line. The album currently has a score of 78 on Metacritic, including a four-star review from Rolling Stone.

Some of this praise is well-deserved; The Rhumb Line is certainly an intriguing effort from an up-and-coming band. However, if you read any of the band’s positive press, it’s hard to ignore the drowning death of drummer/co-songwriter John Pike, and how it has profoundly affected the band’s coverage.

Pike’s story is one that music critics are sure to jump on. For one thing, it’s certainly unique – not every band deals with members who die prematurely. It also provides a specific way for critics to interpret The Rhumb Line.

Consider “Dying Is Fine.”  Even though the album can be seen as a eulogy for Pike, “Dying is Fine” was written far before his death — and as such it looks toward the future, not the past:

No more of this living dying
Just scientific analyzing
Forgive us oh life
The sin of

Death oh baby
You know that dying is fine but maybe
I wouldn’t like death if death were good
Not even if death were good

There are a few different things going on here, and they have very little to do with physical death. On one hand, “Dying is Fine” borrows liberally from an e.e. cummings poem (even the “oh baby” is directly taken). That means that the song is a shout-out to Cummings, and it also comes with some sense of detachment, since the sentiment being expressed came from someone else first.

Also, there is a clear division between “dying” and “death,” the former being physical but the latter being spiritual. Physical death wouldn’t be a big deal, since it’s bound to happen. Spiritual death, on the other hand, is something worth fearing.

In the end, “Dying Is Fine” is really about a common theme — living life to the fullest and doing what you want without fear. Physical death is, as Cummings said in his poem, “perfectly natural.” There’s nothing you can do about it. The only thing you can change is how you live. So do what you want and stop thinking about it.

Given what happened to Pike, any song with the word “dying” in it is going to recall vivid (and obvious) images. However, if you divorce the song’s lyrics from the story behind the album, you could just as easily see it as an expression of someone’s hopes and fears and questions about the future. Pike’s death took a complicated song and gave it a simple explanation.

MP3: Ra Ra Riot – “Dying Is Fine”

Kanye sports a memorable line or two, with: “I know I got it first / I’m Christopher Columbus, y’all just the pilgrims.” But with the mixtape-style beat he jacked from M.I.A., the producer still comes off a bit lackluster. Meanwhile Jay-Z just raps about stacks of money (“Can’t wear skinny jeans ’cause my knots don’t fit”), and Lil Wayne is still using that effing autotune effect. Enter T.I.:

You go see Weezy for the wordplay
Jeezy for the birdplay
Kanyeezy for diversity
And me for controversy

Though more compliment than kiss-off, T.I.’s opening salvo establishes him as the ace in this star-studded deck. His three colleagues have their uses, he’s saying, but by distilling each to a couple words he cuts them down to size while aggrandizing himself. If nothing else, T.I. puts himself on the same level as Jay-Z, Kanye, and Wayne — an impressive feat in itself.

MP3: T.I. – “Swagger Like Us” (feat. Kanye West, Jay-Z, and Lil Wayne)

I’m hot, they fannin’

That’s it; four words. Can anyone beat that? “Fuck you, pay me” gets thrown around a lot, but that’s from Goodfellas. Surprisingly, the best that comes to mind is from Kanye West, who in the song “Two Words” spits:

I am limelight
Blueprint, five mics

In three words he points to his biggest success (at the time) and the pretty irrefutable cred that comes with The Blueprint getting The Source‘s perfect five-mic rating. The list of albums sharing that honor includes the saints of the hip-hop canon: Run-D.M.C., Straight Outta Compton, Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers), The Chronic, Illmatic, and Aquemeni, just to name a few.

So: Who else has achieved such perfection in four words or less? Readers, I need your help on this one.

MP3: Lil Wayne – “Cannon” (feat. Freeway, Detroit Red, Willie the Kid, and Juice)

I’ve always been obsessed with the idea of reincarnation, even though I seriously doubt it’s possible. My curiosity stems from the birth of the idea itself and what it means about humans. If religion is seen as an expression of our hopes and fears, then reincarnation expresses our fear of death. If there was some way to avoid death, we’d take it — even if we didn’t know what was on the other side.

Most people think of reincarnation as a positive idea. However, the Roger Miller song “Reincarnation” presents a completely different picture of it. It starts out as a funny little idea for a love song; what if we weren’t human? Would we still love each other?

If I was a bird and you was a fish
What would we do, I guess we’d wish for
Reincarnation, reincarnation

In this verse reincarnation is a positive thing. In the second verse, Miller calls it a “power” — in this case, a supernatural way to right wrongs. It’s also a somewhat cheesy way of saying you love someone so much that you’re willing to wait a lifetime for them.

Then the third verse completely changes the meaning:

I love you, and don’t you know I always will
You’re a girl, I’m a boy,
But suppose you were a rose
And I was a whip-poor-will

This is a great verse, not just for the use of the word “whip-poor-will” (which surprisingly shows up in a lot of country music; check out “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry” by Hank Williams or “Deeper Than the Holler” by Randy Travis). The examples Miller chooses are effective because they actually make you think. Could you muster some sort of emotion toward a flower or small bird? It’s a tough question — far tougher than if he had used a dog or cat (or, conversely, a cockroach).

This verse shows that reincarnation is not necessarily a good thing. Sure, we all want to live forever, but is turning into a small animal or inanimate object what we mean? Is living enough, or would we have to hold onto the things that make us human?

Here’s Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy covering the song during a solo show.

MP3: Jeff Tweedy – “Reincarnation” (Roger Miller cover)

But lyrically, “Listen to Your Body” bears resemblances to some touchstones that are even more mainstream. Look at these couplets, aggrandizing like a puffy-chested tween boy and awkwardly sexy like a 12-year-old trying on her first “sexy” Halloween costume:

Yes you was tryin’a hex me / All tellin’ me I’m sexy

So now you’re in my bedroom / All talking bout some boom boom
But you really shouldn’t assume / ‘Cause my man’s coming home soon
He tryn’a have a rival / Best stick to your survival
Ain’t tryn’a be liable / I swear it on the Bible

Note the pseudo hip-hop phrasing that doesn’t quite fit the syllables (like the emphasis on “AH-summe”) and the sore-thumb word choices of “hex me” and “liable.” Brings to mind another gem — Black Eyed Peas “My Humps.”

I drive these brothers crazy / I do it on the daily
They treat me really nicely / They buy me all these icies

Awkward, right? Plus, both songs use the same “sexy” and “dance next to me” rhyme.

What’s to glean from all this? Maybe nothing. Maybe just that hip-hop’s reach seeps far into popular music. Maybe that it’s only a matter of time before Black Kids show up on Now That’s What I Call Indie Rock! comp.

But if nothing else, it shows that these Kids from Florida just wanna have fun.

MP3: Black Kids – “Listen to Your Body”

Also, Torontoist has the best headline ever about this.

MP3: Lady and the Tramp – “The Siamese Song”

Now I am tired
It just made me tired
Let’s build ourselves a fire
Let’s build ourselves a fire

These lines are from Jenny Lewis’s new song “Acid Tongue,” also the name of her forthcoming record. In this context, the line “let’s build ourselves a fire” signifies weary resignation; unable to summon the effort for love, she decides to sleep through it, asking her partner to do the same.

But the meaning behind line changes elsewhere in the song, when Lewis sings this:

We build ourselves a fire…
But you know I am a liar…
And you don’t know what I’ve done

These lines signify two things: 1) that Lewis is leaving something out of the story, both to her unloved one and to the listener, and 2) that she, not he, is in control of the situation. She might not have a grip on the relationship, but intentionally or not, it’s clear that she was the one who sabotaged it.

By not telling us “what she’s done,” Lewis also builds a barrier between herself and the listener, as well as any potential suitors (such as the cobbler in the first verse, whose advances she turns down).

And so, beneath the mild drug references and initially ambiguous storytelling, Jenny Lewis delivers a resigned ballad in the tradition of the weathered bluesman. She seems old beyond her years, but little details belie her age. An older singer may have loved and lost. Sharing a fireside bed with a numbed boyfriend, Lewis has lost love but has not yet dusted away the ashes.

Jenny Lewis – “Acid Tongue” (Live)

I have absolutely nothing against Conor Oberst. In fact, I think his self-titled solo album shows that he has come a long way as an artist. Lyrically, it’s leagues better than Cassadaga, which collapsed under its own self-important weight. Still, something about Oberst and Bright Eyes has always bugged me: the whole “next Dylan” thing.

My caveats about comparing Oberst with Bob Dylan have nothing to do with their disparity in talent. I think comparing the two in those terms is insulting to Dylan. The more important difference is the perspective each takes.

No singer in modern memory has made more out of the pronoun “I” than Oberst. Through his music, we know almost everything about him. We know that he’s skeptical about Christianity (“Don’t Know When But a Day is Gonna Come”). We know he hates the current administration (many songs, but “When the President Talks to God” sticks out the most). We are even aware of his alcoholism and drug abuse (“Let’s Not Shit Ourselves,” “Lua”).

Think about this. How much do we know about Bob Dylan? Sure, he uses the pronoun “I” a lot, but rarely does this reveal anything about him. His most famous songs that contain “I” or “me” (“I Want You,” “I Shall Be Released,” “It Aint Me, Babe”) are not even about him. They’re about the potential lover or the man standing next to him in a crowd. They’re about everyone.

With this new album, Oberst is certainly trying to be more ambiguous. I doubt you’ll ever hear him sing a lyric like “Will my number come up eventually? Like Love is some kind of lottery” (from 2002′s “Waste of Paint”) again. Still, there is far more disclosure on the new record than you would ever find in a Dylan song. For instance, check out “Milk Thistle,” which ends the album on an introspective note:

I was poised for greatness
I was down and out
I keep death at my heels
Like a Bassett hound

If I go to heaven I’ll be bored as hell
Like a crying baby at the bottom of a well

On the surface, one could think that he’s saying nothing here, just throwing words at the wall. And in some ways, he certainly is — the interplay of “heaven” and “hell” seems especially contrived. Still, when you look at it closer, “Milk Thistle” is Oberst revealing who he is, warts and all. His entire career has been about expectations — in a couple years, he went from “The Next Dylan” to a burned-out drug addict to, today, an afterthought. Now, he’s trying to come to grips with the fact that he is all those things and none of them. That he wants you to love him, and he also wants you to leave him alone.

Oberst represents an extreme extension of ‘70s singer-songwriters — artists who were willing to sing about their feelings and give fans entry into their personal lives that would have been unheard of in Dylan’s time. In that way, “The Next James Taylor” is probably more appropriate than “The Next Dylan.”

Still, we don’t really need to call Oberst “the next” anything. He’s 28 now. He can go down whatever road he pleases.

MP3: Conor Oberst – “Milk Thistle”

MP3: Elton John -”Social Disease”

No flash in the pan raps are not flashy
Free at last we, will never recycle
the same songs from last week, we’re free of last week
Thank God almighty we free at last, we
Went back to the ashes raw raps and raspy

Monch’s delivery sputters rhythmically as the backbeat jolts his trains of thought, like Harrison Bergeron interrupted by his in-ear noise machine. This leads him to explore every permutation of a phrase like “free at last,” until the repetition of that phrase becomes a sort of paradox. First he promises not to repeat himself. Then he almost does, but instead he pulls a lyrical fakeout, pulling up out of a nose dive with yet another play on “free at last.”

Meanwhile, “Let’s Go” shows what Monch can do once he gets a theme on his mind: exhaust it.

You use sex to sell, your Nextel to Sprint
Everything you represent is immoral
Cingular, not plural
You and your Sidekick get rid of that whack Trio
I freeze emcees zero degrees below
The blacker the berry, the sweeter the juice
You need to get loose, to the heat of produce
From Long Beach to Boston
Your chicks text us like Dallas and Austin
I spark tireless illumination
Fire sixteen bars, wireless communication

That a solid eight cellphone references, six of which are brand names. Not the album’s strongest work, but it shows Monch owning a verse, flexing a new muscle, showing us a new trick. And if that’s not your bag, I’ll leave you with a one-liner, from the song “Desire”:

Still get it poppin’ without artist & repertoire
‘Cause Monch is a monarch only minus the A&R

MP3: Pharoahe Monch – “Body Baby”