Current status: Wayland won. This should still keep working ok, but if it doesn't, I might not fix it anymore.

Mainstream Linux desktop integration is reaching a point where using an alternate window manager causes all sorts of annoyances. With Ubuntu 15.04, the panel refuses to work with xmonad for me, so I'm replacing it with something simpler.

x11-media-keys listens for volume up/down/mute and brightness up/down keys and does the appropriate actions via ALSA and the X11 RandR backlight property.