Two new videos came out this week for songs sung by women in their early 20s. One is the one above. And while it's blatantly banking on reminding people of last year's smash hit "I Love the Way You Lie," and it's always creepy, because of what we know about her real-life past, to watch Rihanna flirting with the notion of domestic violence as turn-on, I like it. It's certainly very titillating. Like Requiem for a Dream, from which it also borrows heavily. The song itself is great, too, which certainly helps. Big dumb disco done just right. I think I like it more than any song of Rihanna's since "Umbrella." As good as it is, though, it pales in comparison to "I'm His Girl," by the new Bushwick, Brooklyn band, Friends. READ MORE

This new Rihanna video is pretty great in an old, candy-painted, classic-days-of-MTV-surrealism way. Directed by Melina Matsoukas, it's like Busta Rhymes meets Tom Petty meets Cyndi Lauper meets Devo. With Perez Hilton bound and gagged and made to crawl around on all fours like a dog.

Apart from sexual fetishes and dining choices, is there anything more subjective than humor? I, for instance, think this Rihanna/Andy Samberg bit from this weekend's "Saturday Night Live" is absolutely hysterical, and normally you need to hit me over the head with a shovel several times to even get me to sit on a couch in front of a TV where that show is playing. Choire, on the other hand, is less entranced. But whatever, you can decide yourself! Stick with it, it really builds. Meanwhile, for the kind of humor for which there is no dispuation-kidding, I know someone will be all, "They were NEVER funny"-there is excellent news. READ MORE

I've been thinking a bunch about what we'll remember 2009 for, besides rampant unemployment and two great flu panics. Mostly that is what I'll remember, but I'll also think of it as the year that the nation became obsessed with jerks and woman-beaters. That Levi Johnston, Jon Gosselin and Chris Brown were pretty much the three most popular "stories" of 2009 is amazing, particularly since those first two haven't ever done or said anything. That all have spent the year pushing new products in the midst of their tabloid scandals is pretty telling. I don't even know what Gosselin or Johnston are selling, besides their brand-but Chris Brown's new album "drops" in a month. Say you are Chris Brown. Would you be putting out an album this year? Much less one with an album cover that looks like you're about to beat some tiny animated critters to death with a space-guitar? As your ex-girlfriend was endlessly making the press rounds, talking about how you had "no soul" in your eyes while you bit her? READ MORE

Last night singer Chris Brown-who recently received five years of probation after entering a guilty plea for assaulting his girlfriend Rihanna-appeared on "Larry King Live" in an attempt to rehabilitate his image and perhaps explain what caused such reprehensible acts. As someone who does not believe that domestic violence is any more glamorous or noteworthy when it is perpetrated by or on celebrities, I have only a cursory awareness of the story, and did not tune in. But Awl Director of Business Development/SEO Coordinator David Cho has been following the case since it began, and was eager to explain it to me. If you're also curious as to what transpired, read on. READ MORE

Live from, uh, MTV Germany: the new video for Jay-Z's "Run This Town." Despite the natural excitement accompanying molotov cocktails and a torch-bearing mob, the whole Mad Max thing-well, we've seen all that before. California was partying like that back 1995. READ MORE

Oh, here is the brand new Kanye West video! I have been interested in him again, since he became the first black Terminator. He came back into our future from the 80s. And he brought Rihanna with him, except she got some Sheena Easton mixed up in her. Okay dance party break!