Since I sample most new music online, I'm a bit bewildered whenever I come across an old-school, printed-on-paper music magazine. Wait, people used to live like this? People used to read word after word after word about sound? How pre-millennial. And yet a great, well-edited, well-written music magazine can still be hugely valuable.

Paste, an independent monthly that also covers film and other pop culture (but not pop-tart culture), bridges the gap by including a carefully curated CD in each monthly issue. I find that the tracks -- there are always at least 20, making this $7.95 magazine/CD package a great deal -- invariably reconnect me with artists I already know and love (like Bright Eyes and the Dears on the November CD) and artists I want to get to know better, as well as artists I've never heard of.

And the editorial material -- covering an eclectic mix ranging from college radio to classic rock, with artists like Tony Bennett, the Mars Volta and Joanna Newsom thrown in for good measure -- is generally pretty great too.