These posts are about the songs that fell just short of crossing the key line of chart success, entering the Billboard Top 40. Every song featured in this series peaked at number 41. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers had a … Continue reading Top 40 Smash Near Misses — “I Need to Know”
These posts celebrate the movie trailers, movie posters, commercials, print ads, and other promotional material that stand as their own works of art. For a few weeks in the late summer and early fall of 1996, nothing made me happier … Continue reading The Art of the Sell — That Thing You Do trailer
293. Cocteau Twins, Blue Bell Knoll (1988) After Cocteau Twins were given their U.S. coming-out party with the release of the 1985 compilation The Pink Opaque, fans had to wait a long time for a proper new studio album from … Continue reading College Countdown: CMJ Top 1000, 1979 – 1989 — #293 to #291
The Most Amazing Bowling Story Ever by Michael J. Mooney That superlative of that title might seem a bit much, but I’m inclined to agree with the assessment. The article is an extraordinary piece of writing, tracking one Texas bowler’s … Continue reading Outside Reading — Strikes to Spare edition
It’s been twenty-six years since Alanis Morissette released Jagged Little Pill. The album was a sensation, launching her to pop superstardom. The relative suddenness of her transition from obscurity to omnipresence combined with her youth made it see like a … Continue reading This Week’s Model — Deep Sea Diver, “Hand in My Pocket”
I read a lot of comic books as a kid. This series of posts is about the comics I read, and, occasionally, the comics that I should have read. I had a very tight budget for comic book purchases when … Continue reading My Misspent Youth — Marvel Two-in-One #75 by Tom DeFalco and Alan Kupperberg
These posts celebrate the movie trailers, movie posters, commercials, print ads, and other promotional material that stand as their own works of art. Come on. Who wouldn’t want to read this comic? Other entries in this series can be found … Continue reading The Art of the Sell — Marvel Two-in-One #75
Chvrches might not have felt like they needed a rebound from their third album, Love Is Dead. There are some signs that the Scottish trio knows they went down a blind alley, both in some stray comments here and there … Continue reading The New Releases Shelf — Screen Violence
Thelonious Monk: Straight, No Chaser (Charlotte Zwerin, 1988). This documentary was released during that strange stretch when Clint Eastwood admirably leveraged his considerable influence with Warner Bros. to get the studio to make movies about jazz. Eastwood serves as producer … Continue reading Then Playing — Thelonious Monk: Straight, No Chaser; Somewhere; Ladies in Retirement
296. Graham Parker and the Rumour, Squeezing Out Sparks (1979) “In the past, I occasionally found the music running away with itself, and I was fighting in the middle of it,” Graham Parker told Rolling Stone not long after the … Continue reading College Countdown: CMJ Top 1000, 1979 – 1989 — #296 to #294
