By SCOTT MERVIS, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Here in the highly opinionated 21st century, we find ourselves in a divisive mood about so many things -- the economy, taxes, health care, the Super Bowl halftime show.

But it seems there are a few things we can agree upon: Blue skies are nice, ice cream is good, puppies are cute and Adele can sing her behind off.

Now that the top 10 lists are out of the way, let's take a look at what's fresh for 2012.

This is generally a fertile time for indie-rock bands, starting with the reunited Guided by Voices and followed by new music from Craig Finn (of The Hold Steady), Magnetic Fields and The Shins, plus the much-anticipated sophomore albums from breakout duos Sleigh Bells and the Ting Tings.

Dan Zanes has won the right to put "Grammy-winning" before his name, but like They Might Be Giants, it's for his second musical calling: children's music.

How mind-blowing would it have been if someone told you in 1968 that the Beatles would play live one more time but that the Monkees would still be going 43 years later?

Being the singer for a Hall of Fame hard-rock band must be a lousy gig.

Robert Plant turned it down to run with a bunch of Appalachian folkies.

Steven Tyler shelved his own gig with Aerosmith and turned down the Led Zeppelin offer to fill the Plant job -- as if that made any sense -- to become a judge this season on fading flower "American Idol."

Bill Cosby may be a sweater-wearing, Jell-O-eating icon of a bygone era, but that doesn't mean he can't fully participate in the current one.

He has a Facebook page and an iPhone app. Over the past several months, he has used Twitter to encourage people to vote, answer his fan mail, plug his performances and, yes, rebut a viral rumor of his demise.

He tweets, therefore he is.

The new concert film "Kenny Chesney: Summer in 3D" attempts to tell the singer's whole story, combining scenes from his most recent tour with extensive archival footage showing how he got there.

His name is Marley, but Ky-Mani didn't grow up as Jamaican royalty like most of his brothers and sisters.

He was born in poverty in Falmouth, Jamaica, without even the luxury of an indoor kitchen or bathroom. His mom, table-tennis champion Anita Belnavis, had a brief romance with reggae king Bob Marley, who had children with and without his wife, Rita.

Grammy-winning producer T-Bone Burnett made his name as a member of Bob Dylan's Rolling Thunder Revue tour back in 1975, so there's poetic justice in him having a hand in Jakob Dylan's success.

Joshua Cain was too young to see The Replacements, Husker Du and Soul Asylum in their prime, but the guitarist for pop-rock band Motion City Soundtrack is old enough to take pride in his hometown Minneapolis scene.

He even thought of his band as one of the hopes for filling that void when those classic post-punk bands moved on.