by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Hey, I’ve got an idea: How ’bout we never use the phrase “They’re killing it” ever again in Twitter/Facebook/anywhere? What do you say? The only phrase more annoying is “No worries.” What are we, in the Outback? STOP IT.

Thursday always has been when I’ve posted my weekly column. I figured this was a good time to explain last week’s column to those who didn’t “get it,” and there were quite a few of you. At least a half-dozen people have asked me what exactly did I mean by “the end of my first column and the beginning of my second.”

Here’s the translation: My music column in The Reader folded last week. That was it. Kaput. Over. End of story. EOL. For those who missed it, you can read the reason for that column’s demise, here.

Next week I begin writing a new column for The Reader. I don’t know what it’ll be called, but it won’t be called Lazy-i. This new column will not be dedicated to indie music, as Lazy-i was. It’ll be a general topic column focused on arts and culture and anything that I can come up with by knocking together the two rocks rolling around in my head. That new column will launch in The Reader next week, and will be exclusive content in the paper and at thereader.com — it won’t be posted here.

This website will continue in its current direction. Nothing will change. It will have the same indie/Omaha music focus that it’s always had and will be updated each weekday over my lunch hour, as it has for the past 1,000 years.

Furthermore, I’ll continue to write feature articles and interviews with bands that will appear both in The Reader and in Lazy-i. In fact, I just did an interview with Tim Kasher last night for an article that’ll be in print in an upcoming issue of The Reader, and also will be posted on this website (along with any extra interview content that wouldn’t fit in The Reader‘s article).

Again, I’d like to thank all of you for reading the printed version of Lazy-i in The Reader over the years. A couple people seemed genuinely upset about its demise, telling me “It’s the only thing I read in The Reader,” and “I’ll never pick up that paper again.” To this I say: “Thank you. I appreciate your kind words. I’m always surprised when I hear that anyone read my column (whether in print or online). But please, keep picking up The Reader. Flip through its pages. If there’s something that you’d like them to cover, interviews you’d like them to conduct, please let them know. Email the editor, John Heaston (john@thereader.com) and tell him what’s missing and what you’d like to see in his pages (which are really your pages, because you’re the customer, and the customer is always right, right?). John will listen. He has to. The only way printed newspapers are going to survive is if the folks producing them listen to their readers and provide the content that they ask for along with the content that the editor thinks they need (Quick, someone write that down and send it to every friggin’ newspaper in the country).”

Another reason you need to continue to pick up The Reader is because MY NEW COLUMN WILL BE PRINTED IN IT! But I don’t want to sound like the egotistical prick that I am. Just saying’ (there’s another phrase that should be abolished).

As I said last week, there will be some (maybe a lot) of overlap between my new column and the old one. I’m not going to avoid music topics, but I’ll also no longer avoid non-music topics. I’ve been wanting to write about local art, music, food, theater, literature, people, dogs, cops, robbers, trees, politicians, boobs, pricks, glass houses and empty buildings for years and have held back because it didn’t fit the Lazy-i format. Now I can. And with that, I’ve just given you a sneak preview of next week’s inaugural column, which remains unnamed. If you have any ideas, pass them my way.

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And speaking of my continuing music coverage in The Reader, yours truly will again be covering South By Southwest in Austin. Originally, it didn’t look like I was going, but things have changed and I’ll be reporting from Austin again this year, posting daily for thereader.com and Lazy-i.com. Let’s hope the weather is better than the last time I went two years ago, when it was cold and rainy and miserable. Please, pray to your gods.

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Lincoln Exposed continues tonight. Early report from Mr. Jeremy Buckley is that crowds at yesterday’s shows were at record levels. If you’re in the Capital City tonight, you should go, because there ain’t jack shit happening in Omaha tonight. Full schedule is here (in Facebook).

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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2012 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.