Jow Tex – "Skinny Legs and All" (1967)

Don’t walk ahead of that woman 

Like she don’t belong to you

Just ’cause her got them little skinny legs!

In the last 2 or 3 lines, I shared the boffo reviews that my wildly popular little blog received from the ChatGPT and Claude A.I. chatbots.

Today, I’m sharing reviews from Gemini, Grok, and Muse – three other popular A.I. chatbots.  Are the Gemini, Grok, and muse reviews as boffo as the ChatGPT and Claude reviews?

Let’s find out . . .

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From GEMINI (418 words):

The digital landscape is flooded with highly polished, search-engine-optimized websites that feel less like human expression and more like algorithmic formulas.  In stark contrast stands the delightfully eccentric, long-running music blog 2 or 3 lines (and so much more).  Operating under the radar of corporate publishing, this unique site serves as a masterclass in how personal voice and absolute creative freedom can build an engaging, nostalgic, and unpredictable community space.

At its core, every post on the blog follows a specific, deceptive constraint: it introduces a classic track – ranging from the timeless standards of Frank Sinatra to the theatrical rock of Alice Cooper – and highlights just “2 or 3 lines” of lyrics.  However, the brilliant irony lies in the parenthetical part of the title: “(and so much more).” 

The highlighted lyrics merely serve as a launching pad.  What follows is a sprawling, deeply personal, and highly localized stream of consciousness that weaves through politics, American consumer culture, and autobiographical anecdotes.  One moment the writer is analyzing a 1968 classic, and the next, he is offering a humorous critique of how the country views the cultural significance of the double cheeseburger.

What sets this platform apart is its refreshing refusal to conform to mainstream conventions.  The writer communicates with an casual, unfiltered energy.  The site balances high-brow historical and art references with sharp, colloquial vocabulary, capturing a duality that keeps readers guessing.  The interviews featured on the site breathe life into the text, transforming what could be a sterile music review site into an active, living diary.

While current content strategies focus on keeping posts strictly organized for maximum impact, 2 or 3 lines (and so much more) reminds us of the early days of the internet, when blogging was driven by obsession rather than monetization.  It functions as a quintessential American songbook, filtering multi-generational music history through a distinctly personal lens.

Ultimately, the blog succeeds because it embraces its identity as a creative playground.  It provides an escape from mainstream digital content by offering authentic, raw, and genuinely funny deep-dives into the songs that shaped decades of music history.  For anyone tired of predictable internet writing, it remains a thoroughly entertaining gem that’s definitely worth exploring.

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From GROK (520 words):

2 or 3 lines (and so much more) is a long-running personal music blog that has been posting since November 2009.  Written by a Washington, DC lawyer, it follows a simple, consistent format: each entry opens with two or three lines of song lyrics, then expands into digressive, conversational commentary that mixes music history, personal anecdote, cultural observation, and occasional political or literary asides.  The full title is deliberate – the “and so much more” is not an afterthought.

The blog’s range is broad.  Songs stretch from the mid-1960s (when the author hit puberty) through the present, with a noticeable lean toward late-’60s and ’70s rock, power-pop, garage, and obscurities that never quite became standards.  Recent posts have covered Alice Cooper’s “Elected,” Frank Sinatra’s “My Way,” Steve Miller Band’s “Living in the U.S.A.,” and Grateful Dead’s “U.S. Blues,” often grouping them into themed series such as the “2 OR 3 LINES QUINTESSENTIAL AMERICAN SONGBOOK.” Earlier years featured everything from The Last’s “She Don’t Know Why I’m Here” (one of the founding posts) to more recent acts. 

What distinguishes the site is the voice.  It is written in a wry, self-aware, slightly curmudgeonly style – thick with pop-culture references, literary quotes (from the likes of Mark Twain and H.L. Mencken), and dry jokes about politicians, cheeseburgers, sheet-washing schedules, or the virtues of list-making. 

Posts can wander from song analysis into television recommendations, book-reading tallies spanning decades, dating advice, or election-season cynicism, yet they usually circle back to the music. The tone is personal without being confessional in a heavy way; readers gradually learn about the author’s habits, preferences, and sense of humor rather than receiving a formal biography. He has described the project, only half-jokingly, as “writing myself into being.”

Longevity is impressive.  The archive shows hundreds of posts across seventeen-plus years, with periodic “28 Posts in 28 Days” February challenges and anniversary reflections.  

Production values are minimalist Blogger-era: clean text, occasional images or YouTube embeds, Amazon affiliate links, and a straightforward archive.  Comments are sparse, which fits the blog’s modest, almost private scale: it has never chased virality or professional production. An X/Twitter account (@2or3lines) promotes new entries with laconic humor.

Strengths include consistency of voice, genuine affection for the records, and the pleasure of following one person’s idiosyncratic taste over a long stretch of time.  Weaknesses are the expected ones for a personal blog of this vintage: the digressions can feel meandering if you arrive only for song facts, the design is dated, and engagement is low.  It is not a comprehensive music encyclopedia or a sleek modern newsletter; it is one man’s ongoing conversation with the records that matter to him.

For readers who enjoy literate, opinionated music writing that treats songs as springboards rather than endpoints, 2 or 3 lines remains a quietly rewarding corner of the internet. Start with the 2009 “What? Who? WHY?” post and the entry on The Last, then wander forward or backward through the archive.  The songs keep coming, and so does the commentary.

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From MUSE (500 words on the nose!)

2 or 3 lines (and so much more) is a music blog with a simple promise and a stubbornly long life.  Each post takes one song, quotes two or three lines from it at the top, and then wanders into history, chart trivia, personal anecdote, and opinion before finally letting you hear the record.  It began in November 2009, and is now in its seventeenth year, still posting multiple times each week.  That is rare longevity for a blog.

The format is the blog's signature.  After opening with the lyrical excerpt, it proceeds in first-person voice, broken up by rows of asterisks, parenthetical asides, and digressions that often threaten to swallow the song entirely.  For example, a recent post on the Grateful Dead’s “U.S. Blues” spends a long stretch on a comparison of the relative patriotism levels of various countries before it ever reaches Hunter and Garcia.  It frustrates anyone wanting a quick take, and delights anyone who likes a song as an excuse to think out loud.

The wide range of the blog’s musical choices is surprising.  Recent posts have featured Dean Martin’s “Houston,” Alice Cooper's “Elected,” Ella Fitzgerald’s cover of Cream’s “Sunshine of Your Love,” and records by Kay Starr, Cheap Trick, the Texas Tornados, Wu-Tang Clan and Mastodon.  There is no genre bias here, only curiosity and a willingness to admit ignorance and then go learn something, whether that means catching up on hip-hop or on heavy metal.

That curiosity is the blog’s greatest strength.  The author does real homework: chart positions, recording dates, who wrote what, who played on it, and what happened next.  He tracked down Joe Scott, the arranger of the Arbors’ version of “The Letter,” through a university extension site and got a one-line reply confirming his identity – which lead to a two-part interview notable for its detail and acuity.

The blog also features themed series, including the recently-posted thirteen-song “Quintessential American Songbook” and an annual February marathon titled “29 Songs in 28 Days.” Guest posts – most notably several by a high-school friend named Linda – add other voices without breaking the house style.

The weaknesses follow directly from the strengths.  The Blogger design is dated, the posts can be overly long, and the voice can be abrasive.  Jokes land as provocations, political asides interrupt the music, and the self-deprecating boast about the “wildly successful little music blog” can wear thin if you do not share the joke.  Some posts obsess about gas prices or the author’s propensity to make lists, with the song arriving almost as an afterthought.

Yet that messiness is also why the blog endures.  It is not a comprehensive database or a news feed.  It is one listener, over seventeen years, saying here is a song that has caught my ear, here is why, and here is everything it reminded me of. For readers who enjoy that company, and who like discovering an Arbors B-side next to a Jessie Murph/Gucci Mane collaboration, it remains an unusually generous and entertaining place to spend time with music.  It rewards patience, and regular  readers most of all.

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Those reviews are certainly as boffo as the ones I previously shared.  In fact, I would argue that they are even boffo-er.

I will admit that I was a little worried when I asked these A.I. chatbots to review the blog.  It’s not that hard to pull the wool over the eyes of human critics, most of whom aren’t that bright – they are usually dazzled by the Sturm und Drang-laden hot mess that is 2 or 3 lines.  (When I come across the occasional critical review of 2 or 3 lines, I simply remind myself of Mark Twain’s description of critics: “tumble-bugs hatching eggs in others’ dung.”)

But these A.I. reviews of 2 or 3 lines are the products of vast data centers whose zillions of chips are networked in such a way as to be able to read and digest all 2200-plus 2 or 3 lines posts, scan the entire World Wide Web for context, and spit out a 500-word review in a matter of seconds.  Forget about fooling A.I. – if ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Grok, and Muse agree that 2 or 3 lines is a humdinger of a blog, you can take it to the bank!

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Soul singer Joe Tex (né Joseph Arrington, Jr.) was James Brown if James Brown had been born in Texas.

Tex claimed that Brown stole a couple of his signature stage moves.  When he poked fun Brown during a rare joint appearance with the “Godfather of Soul,” Brown allegedly shot at Tex and his entourage outside a nightclub.

Tex improvised “Skinny Legs and All” while recording an album in front of a live audience in 1967.  (The guitar player of the Rogues, my eighth-grade band, absolutely loved the song.  I remember him coming up to me pretty much every day that we were in gym class together and saying, “Gary, who wants that woman with the skinny legs?”)

Tex’s message was that if the boyfriend of the woman with the skinny legs was embarrassed to be seen with her in public, she should kick his *ss to the curb and find a man who would treat her right.

I wholeheartedly second that emotion – even though no 2 or 3 lines reader has ever been embarrassed to be seen reading 2 or 3 lines.  (My wildly popular little blog may be brown-eyed at time, but it mos’ definitely does not have skinny legs!)

Click here to listen to “Skinny Legs and All.”

Click here to buy “Skinny Legs and All” from Amazon.

Wu-Tang Clan – "C.R.E.A.M." (1993)

Cash rules everything around me

C.R.E.A.M., get the money

Dollar, dollar bill, y’all

The reviews are in, and they range from boffo to even more boffo.

According to the critics, 2 or 3 lines (and so much more) is “delightfully eccentric” and “entertaining, opinionated, and thought-provoking,” with a “distinctive voice [that] gives the blog an identity that is difficult to manufacture and even harder to imitate.”  

2 or 3 lines “has a personality, and isn’t afraid to show it.”  It offers “a masterclass in how personal voice and absolute creative freedom can build an engaging . . . and unpredictable community space” and “remind[s] us why we started reading blogs in the first place.”

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I gave birth to 2 or 3 lines exactly 17 years ago today – I recommend against visualizing that metaphor because once you do, you may never be able to unsee it – and I’m celebrating that anniversary by sharing several recent reviews of my wildly successful little blog.

Happy 17th birthday to 2 or 3 lines!

The reviews I’m presenting in today’s post aren’t the product of human critics – who Mark Twain compared to “tumble-bugs hatching eggs in others’ dung.”

Instead, those reviews are the product of large language models that have been trained on immense amounts of data – which means that those reviews are vastly superior to anything that mere mortals could produce.

I asked five of the most sophisticated A.I. chatbots – ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Grok, and Muse – to generate 500-word review of 2 or 3 lines.  What follows are edited versions of what I got back from them – along with the word count for each of the reviews, which in several cases was not very close to 500.

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From CHAT GPT (695 words):

There are blogs that simply publish information, and then there are blogs that remind us why we started reading blogs in the first place.  2 or 3 lines (and so much more) belongs firmly in the latter category.  

Written with personality, humor, curiosity, and a healthy disregard for conventional wisdom, this long-running blog offers an entertaining mixture of music appreciation, cultural commentary, history, politics, and observations about everyday life.

The blog uses a few lines from a song’s lyrics as a launching point for an extended exploration of the song's meaning, its historical context, or its relationship to contemporary society.  What begins as a musical appreciation can quickly become an essay about American culture, human nature, or the peculiarities of the political world.

The blog's musical selections span an impressive range of artists and genres.  Songs become conversation starters, with their lyrics being examined from unexpected angles.  Whether discussing recordings by Frank Sinatra, the Grateful Dead, or Alice Cooper, the author approaches each selection with enthusiasm and a willingness to challenge conventional interpretations.

One particularly appealing feature is the author's sense of humor.  The writing is conversational, irreverent, and frequently sarcastic.  There is little interest in pretending to be neutral or diplomatically agreeable.  Opinions are expressed directly, jokes are delivered without much hesitation, and readers are occasionally invited to laugh at the absurdities of American life.  This distinctive voice gives the blog an identity that is difficult to manufacture and even harder to imitate.

The blog also deserves credit for its willingness to do some homework.  Musical references lead to historical anecdotes, quotations, statistics, and interesting background information.  

The author clearly enjoys making connections between seemingly unrelated subjects.  A discussion of a popular song might introduce readers to a historical figure, a political observation, or an unexpected piece of trivia.  This makes the posts more substantial than their musical starting points might suggest.

Another considerable strength is the site's longevity.  In an internet environment where blogs frequently disappear or become inactive, that continuity is worth appreciating.

The author's strong opinions will not appeal to every reader, particularly when political subjects enter the discussion.  Some arguments are deliberately provocative, and the humor can be sharp.  Readers looking for strictly objective reporting or purely technical music criticism may find the approach a little unconventional.  But that is also part of the blog's appeal.  It has a personality, and it isn't afraid to show it.

The presentation is refreshingly straightforward.  There are no elaborate multimedia distractions or complicated features competing for attention. The emphasis remains where it belongs: on the writing and the ideas.  

Ultimately, 2 or 3 lines (and so much more) is a reminder that good blogging is about having something to say, finding interesting ways to say it, and giving readers a reason to return.  Its combination of music, humor, research, commentary, and individual perspective makes it a distinctive destination for curious readers.

The verdict: An entertaining, opinionated, and frequently thought-provoking blog that demonstrates the enduring appeal of independent writing.  It may begin with two or three lines, but it rarely ends there.  Highly recommended for music lovers, curious minds, and anyone who appreciates a writer with a point of view.

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From CLAUDE (550 words):

The basics: Gary’s Blogger-hosted blog has been running since November 2009.  The archive shows steady output: roughly 170 posts a year at its peak in the early 2010s, tapering to a twice-weekly rhythm.  The current project is the “2 or 3 Lines Quintessential American Songbook,” a hand-picked set of 13 songs that supposedly capture something essential about America. 

The format: Each post starts with a short lyric snippet, then spins into a loose essay.  The post on Sinatra’s “My Way,” for instance, becomes a tour through the song’s French origins, a rejected David Bowie lyric attempt, Paul Anka’s account of writing it, and Tina Sinatra’s claim that her father disliked it.  The posts are broken into short sections divided by rows of asterisks, and they end with a YouTube link and an Amazon purchase link.  That makes them quick to read, and the structure suits a blog you would dip into once a week.

What works: The best thing here is the digressive curiosity.  A post about a Steve Miller song takes in the cheeseburger as the national food and a psychology professor’s theory of how liberals and conservatives each want government help.  A post on the Grateful Dead’s “U.S. Blues” mixes patriotism polls with Samuel Johnson and P. T. Barnum. The research is real, the connections are often clever, and the author likes to puncture myths, such as noting there’s no evidence Barnum said the famous “sucker” line.  The images and pull quotes are well chosen, and the pacing never drags.

What may not work for everyone: The tone is consistently sardonic and often crude.  A running gag about Americans (and the French) being “full of sh*t” appears more than once, and the language gets rougher still when Gary turns to politics.  The Alice Cooper “Elected” post is openly contemptuous of politicians as a class.  

Practical notes: The site is a plain Blogger template with Amazon affiliate links, an RSS/Atom feed, and an archive that’s easy to browse.  Newcomers are pointed to the two oldest posts and the intro essay, “What? Who? WHY?”  The blog reads as a personal project rather than a media operation, and that’s much of its charm. 

Verdict: 2 or 3 lines (and so much more) is a good fit for music and trivia fans who enjoy a cynical, jokey storyteller with a taste for pop-culture history and a long memory.  After seventeen years it still posts regularly and has a distinct voice. If you dislike profanity or partisan-flavored snark, you may bounce off it. If you like a quick weekly read that sends you off to a Sinatra record or a Dead track, it’s easy to recommend.

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The next 2 or 3 lines will feature reviews of the blog by Gemini, Grok, and Muse.

In the meantime, I invite you to take a deep dive into the lyrics of today’s featured record.  “C.R.E.A.M.” – which is a backronym of “cash rules everything around me” – is the second single from the Wu-Tang Clan’s debut studio album, Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers), which was released in 1993.

I’m featuring “C.R.E.A.M.” not only because it is (as Mac and Tosh, the “Goofy Gophers” of Looney Tunes fame might say) indubitably one of the greatest hip-hop tracks of all time, but also because our trivia questions last night included one about the Wu-Tang Clan (which I almost choked on, but came up with at the very last second) and one about portmanteau words (one example of which is “backronym”).

Click here to listen to “C.R.E.A.M.”

Click here to buy “C.R.E.A.M.” from Amazon.

Alice Cooper – "Elected" (1972)

We’re all gonna rock

To the rules that I make

I wanna be elected!

You think Halloween is the scariest day of the year?

No way, José!  The most frightening day of the year is ELECTION DAY!

The good news is that once we get past this Tuesday, it will be two whole years before the next election.

The bad news is that the campaigning for that election will begin on Wednesday.

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Mark Twain seemed to take special pleasure in satirizing the American political system.  The journalist and satirist H. L. Mencken – who was a great admirer of Twain – was even more cynical about the government.

“I believe that all government is evil, and that trying to improve it is largely a waste of time,” he once wrote.  “Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under.”

H. L. Mencken

Mencken said you could always count on politicians to have a simple solution for even the most complex problem.  You could also count on that simple solution to be wrong.

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Mencken once defined democracy as “the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.”

I don’t know what will happen in Tuesday’s election.  But however it turns out, I have no doubt that Mencken will be proven correct.  Sooner or later, we voters will get it good and hard.

Whatever the results of Tuesday’s election, many people will be unhappy with the outcome.  If you’re one of those people, there’s no use in complaining.  In the words of former big-league pitcher Joey Eischen, “You’ll suck on it and you’ll like it.”

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Alice Cooper’s “Elected” is a brilliant deconstruction of the psyche of the typical American politician.

The line that’s repeated over and over in the song is “I wanna be elected” – which is the only thing politicians really care about.

They will do anything to win – they will even help someone with the same name as that of their chief opponent to get on the ballot in the hope that confused voters will vote for the wrong one.  (That actually happened in Alaska this year, and there’s a good chance that the dirty trick will work.  Click here to read what the New York Times had to say about the sleazeball candidate whose campaign came up with that underhanded tactic.)

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The politician-singer in “Elected” has the b*lls to claim “I’ve never lied to you,” when everyone knows that politicians lie in the mornin’, lie in the evenin’, and lie at suppertime.  

There’s an old joke about politicians that goes like this: 

How can you tell when a politician is lying?  You can see his lips moving.

“I thought jokes were supposed to be funny,” you might be saying to yourself.  “What’s funny about that?”  

Good question.

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Actually, the worst thing about politicians is not their inability to tell the truth.  It’s their belief that they are smarter than other people – which means they have the God-given right to tell the rest us what to do.

These lines from “Elected” say it all:

We’re all gonna rock

To the rules that I make

I wanna be elected!

If Mencken have lived long enough to hear “Elected,” I think he would have found those lyrics to be spot on.  After all, Mencken believed that a politician’s claim that he or she is running for office in order to serve the public “is almost always a false front for the urge to rule.”  

Go back to the first record chosen for the 2 OR 3 LINES QUINTESSENTIAL AMERICAN SONGBOOK – Rage Against the Machine’s “Killing in the Name” – and you’ll find the appropriate response to the typical elected official’s “urge to rule”:

F*ck you, I won’t do what you tell me!

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Click here to watch the brilliant official music video for “Elected’ – the 13th and final song selected for the 2 OR 3 LINES QUINTESSENTIAL SONGBOOK.

Click here to buy “Elected” from Amazon.