The celebrated alt-country group Centro-Matic hails from Denton, Texas. What began as a side project for singer-songwriter and guitarist Will Johnson in the 1990s soon grew into a full-fledged band. With 20 albums in just 14 years, Centro-Matic has built a solid reputation for playful yet masterful, country-infused rock. With Matt Pence, Scott Danborn and Mark Hedman supporting Johnson's quick wit and pop influences, Centro-Matic's catalog exudes both boundless energy and emotional restraint.
Outgoing Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh speaks to the press at the presidential palace in Sanaa on Jan. 22.
Defense attorneys for a detainee held at the military prison at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base have asked a military judge to subpoena Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh.
The attorneys representing Abd Al-Rahim al-Nashiri, a Saudi man accused of orchestrating the bombing of the USS Cole off Yemen in 2000 and of leading an al-Qaida cell in Yemen, say president Saleh could have information important to the case. President Saleh, who suffered severe burns after an attack on a mosque during the uprising in the Yemen last year, arrived in New York for medical treatment over the weekend.
The U.S. and NATO are aiming to end their combat operations in Afghanistan in 2013, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told reporters today as he flew to Brussels for NATO meetings.
According to The Washington Post, "Panetta's remarks were the first time the Obama administration has said it could foresee an end to regular U.S. and NATO combat operations by the second half of next year."
Fans in Tom Brady and Eli Manning jerseys sit before a November game between the New England Patriots and the New York Giants in Foxborough, Mass. Heading into a Super Bowl rematch, neighboring Connecticut's fans are split between the teams.
Credit Scott Halleran / Getty Images
New England fan Nick Lower holds up cartoon cutouts with the likenesses of Patriots players Tuesday ahead of Super Bowl XLVI against the New York Giants in Indianapolis.
This weekend's Super Bowl match-up has special significance for football fans in Connecticut. The state is nominally part of New England, so you might expect to find overwhelming support for the Patriots. But Connecticut's loyalty seems to lean toward the New York Giants instead.
A crew of linemen working for Puget Sound Energy remove a power pole that fell down after a tree covered in ice fell on a transmission line near a substation in January in Olympia, Wash. Weather and tree branches cause 40 percent of power outages in the U.S.
Last month, a week of winter weather cut power to hundreds of thousands of people in the Seattle area for several days.
A lot of those people were left pondering an old question: Why are their neighborhood power lines strung aboveground?
President Obama holds a proposed mortgage application in Falls Church, Va., Wednesday, Feb. 1, 2012.
When President Obama on Wednesday said at an event to promote an administration proposal to help pinched homeowners: "But it is wrong for anybody to suggest that the only option for struggling, responsible homeowners is to sit and wait for the housing market to hit bottom," he clearly had someone in mind.
They might welcome a massage, come Sunday. New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady and teammates train for this weekend's Super Bowl in Indianapolis.
Super Bowl players and weekend jocks routinely head for the massage table after competition, figuring it helps reduce muscle soreness.
That search for relief has been more out of hope than based in fact.
But scientists now say that massage reduces inflammation caused by exercise, making a rubdown nature's answer to Advil.
The knighthood of Fred Goodwin (shown here in 2007), former chief executive of the Royal Bank of Scotland, has been "canceled and annulled," the British government announced Tuesday. Under Goodwin's leadership, the bank nearly collapsed in 2008, leading to $70 billion bailout by British taxpayers and outrage over his large pension.
Credit Jeff J. Mitchell / Getty Images
A glazier removes a smashed window at Goodwin's home in Edinburgh, Scotland, after it was attack by vandals overnight on March 25, 2009. Public outrage ran high after the disgraced banker left his job with a pension of more than $1 million a year. Eventually, he agreed — reluctantly — to half that amount.
Until recently, the former head of the Royal Bank of Scotland was known as Sir Fred Goodwin. Now, he's plain old Fred. Goodwin has been stripped of his knighthood because of the prominent role he played in RBS' near-failure. But not all Britons are happy.
A couple of years ago, Goodwin could do no wrong. He had turned RBS into one of the biggest banks in the world. Known as "Fred the Shred" because of his ruthless cost-cutting, Goodwin was immensely rich, beloved by investors, and at home, a knight of the realm, a title he received in 2004.
Two senators who have taken the lead on legislation aimed to help homeowners refinance at historically low interest rates were blunt this morning about how concerned they are by the news NPR reported earlier this week that Freddie Mac "has placed multibillion-dollar bets against American homeowners being able to refinance to cheaper mortgages."
Communist Party activists in Moscow campaign on Dec. 2 for the party's candidates in parliamentary elections. The Russian Communist Party is hoping to capitalize on a wave of dissatisfaction with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and his ruling United Russia party.
Credit Krill Kudryavtsev / AFP/Getty Images
Gennady Zyuganov, speaking at a news conference in Moscow on Jan. 26, has led the Russian Communist Party since 1993. Many younger Communists say they yearn for a more modern and flexible leader.
A snazzy new Communist Party poster shows two young, tech-savvy and attractive Russians. Both are smiling and dressed in red: The woman holds a red iPhone; the man holds a red laptop, his T-shirt emblazoned with a hammer and sickle.
Chris Taylor, who has worked with Grizzly Bear and others, now performs under the name CANT.
Chris Taylor may not be a household name, but you've probably encountered some of his work. Taylor was the bassist, producer and backing vocalist of Grizzly Bear on Yellow House and Veckatimest, in addition to running his own record label, Terrible Records.
From left, FBI Director Robert Mueller, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, and CIA Director David Petraeus take their seats on Capitol Hill in Washington on Tuesday, prior to testifying before the Senate Intelligence Committee hearing.
As part of his yearly report to the Senate's Select Committee on Intelligence, the United States' intelligence chief said that depending how threatened Iran feels, it may be more willing to launch an attack against the U.S.
Mitt Romney had reason to smile on Florida primary day, Jan. 31, 2012.
With virtually all polls giving him a solid lead among Florida's Republican voters, Mitt Romney is expected to handily win the Sunshine State's GOP primary Tuesday, putting him back on course for his party's presidential nomination.
Joe Hagan's cover story in the January 22, 2012 edition of New York Magazine details why the 2012 election will be the "most negative in the history of American politics."
Credit Daniella Zalcman / Daniella Zalcman
Joe Hagan is a contributing editor at New York Magazine and Vanity Fair. He has previously worked for The Wall Street Journal and The New York Observer.
If you thought the 2008 election cycle was full of negative ads, just wait until 2012's campaign gets fully underway.
The upcoming presidential campaign, says journalist Joe Hagan, is expected to "be the most negative in the history of American politics."
In India, Starbucks will have to compete with this locally-owned coffee chain, Cafe Coffee Day.
"Skinny venti quad decaf latte" is not a household term in India. But that may be about to change, as Elliot Hannon reports from New Delhi on today's Morning Edition.
Condoms like this one were given out during the African National Congress party's centenary celebrations in early Now a South African health official says that 1.35 million of them are being recalled amid charges some broke during sex.
The party may be over, but the trouble may just be starting in South Africa.
Occupy D.C. protesters shout slogans after erecting a tent over the statue of Civil War Maj. Gen. James Birdseye McPherson at McPherson Square in Washington.
The Occupy D.C. encampment received notice that as of noon yesterday, camping would not be allowed at McPherson Square, the downtown Washington, D.C. park they've occupied for months now.
But that deadline came and went and instead of heeding the warning from the National Park Service, the protesters erected an even bigger tent. The protesters draped a huge blue tarp emblazoned with the words "Tent of Dreams" over the statue of Maj. Gen. James B. McPherson in the middle of the park.
The CBO reports that is nearly 7 percent of the United States' GDP, but is "nearly 2 percentage points below the deficit recorded in 2011, but still higher than any deficit between 1947 and 2008."
