Our favourite things today, and possibly for the weekend too.

1 Steely Dan/70s Beach Boys/Gentlemen's Agreement Having witnessed the mighty Gentlemen's Agreement a few weeks ago supporting the New Royal Family's triumphant exit from the World Stage (aka the Islington Buffalo Bar), Shabby Culture has developed an unquenchable thirst for immaculately produced 70s rock. Two sides to this coin. There’s the pure and unironic beauty of the Beach Boys’ Brother Years, where honed and immaculate harmonies came together with the warm, smooth production of the best studios and made the finest music of their career - The Trader being the pick of a phenomenal bunch. The flip is the uber-obsessive Walter Becker and Donald Fagen's Steely Dan - ironic jazz rock blues intricacy anyone? Anyone? Oh go on. They are also enormously funny men, as their imbroglio with Wes Anderson shows.

Gentlemen's Agreement are in concert tonight at the Wilmington Arms, if you want your funked-out smoothness within walking distance of Farringdon tube.

2 Vincent Delerm’s Cosmopolitan Pretentious? Nous? God though, Vincent Delerm is great. There are so many songs we could have chosen, but this is belle beyond belief. For those non-French speakers, it's written by a man re-reading Cosmopolitan as a cup of tea goes cold, filling in the love quiz and failing to answer the question, “Have you cheated on your lover?”

3 Duke Special’s Our Love Goes Deeper Than This Vincent worked on Favourite Song with Neil Hannon, which reminded us of this video, where Neil Hannon enters the room as he starts singing in an extremely satisfying manner. Duke Special has an album out, which one member of the Shabby office is travelling around with.

4 Andrey Arshavin answers your questions By day (and some evenings from around 7.45 to about 9.51), Andrey Arshavin is a prodigiously skilled, scurrying little attacking midfielder for Arsenal and Russia. The rest of the time he is an agony aunt, philosopher and raconteur, addressing fans' questions on his website with a healthy mix of direct and gnomic replies. Nothing flummoxes this fox in the box.

5 Arguments About Music Online Shabby Culture has been busy working at work recently. This is a terrible state of affairs. But this afternoon we've been engaged in THREE simultaneous arguments on three different sites about the relative value of Lady Gaga and Grizzly Bear. This is an argument no one can win, that means nothing to anyone, and will be as anachronistic as a Hummer spray-painted with a triptych of Nixon, Bush and W. Bush in about three weeks. But the ancient siren call of a good old barney about music on a Friday afternoon when Shabby should be working? It's too much to resist.