Author: Dan Seeger

TelevisionLeave a comment

Laughing Matters: Larry Wilmore on Martin Luther King Jr.

Dan Seeger

Sometimes comedy illuminates hard truths with a pointed urgency that other means can’t quite achieve. Sometimes comedy is just funny. This series of posts is mostly about the former instances, but the latter is valuable, too. On this day that has been dominated by continuing discussions of the U.S. president elect’s infantile anger towards one of the undisputed heroes of the Civil Rights Movement and celebrity imbeciles offering condescending lectures on proper social discourse, I was reminded on one of Larry Wilmore’s more inspired contributions back in the day he was the “Senior Black Correspondent” on The Daily Show. And that was … Continue reading Laughing Matters: Larry Wilmore on Martin Luther King Jr.

MusicLeave a comment

CMJ Top 250 Songs, 1979 – 1989, 94 – 92

Dan Seeger

94. Ziggy Marley and the Melody Makers, “Tomorrow People” Realistically, the 1988 album Conscious Party was always meant to be be a sort of coming out party for Ziggy Marley. Signed to Virgin Records with his band the Melody Makers, which included a handful of his siblings, the son of the most legendary reggae artist of all time was a focus of the new label, certain they’d be able to capitalize on the familial connection with all those high school and college kids who tacked posters of the Legend album cover to their walls. Talking Heads members and Tom Tom Club … Continue reading CMJ Top 250 Songs, 1979 – 1989, 94 – 92

Music1 Comment

One for Friday: Dsico, “Dirty Bottle”

Dan Seeger

In writing about the music of 2016, I noted that the inclusion of major pop stars was something of an anomaly for me. I’ve long carried a certain snobbishness about the tracks that easily carry over to Top 40 radio (if that’s even a thing any more), an intellectual affliction I suspect a great deal of a college radio alumni carry with them. When bands that fall into the alternative or indie rock realm cross over, they’re reflexively dismissed as a sell-outs, and when material seems as designed to appeal to mass audiences as a plastic container for laundry soap, … Continue reading One for Friday: Dsico, “Dirty Bottle”

Film1 Comment

Now Playing: Hidden Figures

Dan Seeger

Hidden Figures is just good enough that I wish it were better. The film, fictionalized from Margot Lee Shetterly’s recently released history book of the same name, digs into the sadly under-shared story of the African-American women who were centrally involved in the monumentally difficulty scientific and mathematic work that drove the U.S. space program in the nineteen-sixties. In a way, it’s satisfying that the film is stodgily constructed and strangely facile in its examination of how the obvious talents of these women needed to scramble around the confining, casually bigoted norms of the era. In the field of Hollywood … Continue reading Now Playing: Hidden Figures

FilmLeave a comment

Larraín, Lubitsch, Riley, Snyder, Sollett

Dan Seeger

No (Pablo Larraín, 2012). In Chile in  the late nineteen-eighties, the dictatorial government of General Augusto Pinochet orchestrated a public vote to give the populace a chance to weigh in on whether or not they’d maintain control for another eight years after a decade-and-a-half of bludgeoning rule. With various systems under tight control and the people largely cowed by governmental forces, it was expected to be a mere formality on the way to maintaining continuity, a show of phony democracy to appease the international community. Instead, Pinochet was ousted. In this consideration by screenwriter Pedro Peirano and director Pablo Larraín, the … Continue reading Larraín, Lubitsch, Riley, Snyder, Sollett

Everything ElseLeave a comment

Laughing Matters: “Shining”

Dan Seeger

Sometimes comedy illuminates hard truths with a pointed urgency that other means can’t quite achieve. Sometimes comedy is just funny. This series of posts is mostly about the former instances, but the latter is valuable, too. It’s been some time since I taught a film class, and the likelihood of that task ever again falling to me dwindles by the day. Even so, I have a little mental tally of the material I’d like to use to illustrate the possibilities and parameters of cinema to a roomful of students. My fictional lecture supplements aren’t loaded with full films so much … Continue reading Laughing Matters: “Shining”

Everything ElseLeave a comment

Beers I Have Known: Toppling Goliath pseudoSue

Dan Seeger

This series of posts is dedicated to the many, many six packs, pony kegs and pints that have sauntered into my life at one point or another. This is how it began. When we lived in North Caroline and visited Wisconsin, we would occasionally stop at a Dairyland liquor store before exiting across the the state line on our homeward trip, securing a few brews we couldn’t easily acquire in the south. On one such shopping excursion, one of the proprietors of the liquor store in question spied us amassing quite a hefty stack of bottles and cans, seemingly with … Continue reading Beers I Have Known: Toppling Goliath pseudoSue

MusicLeave a comment

CMJ Top 250 Songs, 1979 – 1989, 97 – 95

Dan Seeger

97. Howard Jones, “New Song” “I’ve played in lots of bands since I was fifteen,” Howard Jones explained in 1983, at the time his debut single, “New Song,” was bounding up the charts. “But the thing that got me down was that other people in the band used to land up arguing at the end of the day, and I wasn’t really into that. So I decided I just wanted to get in with it in my own way. I found there wasn’t anyone around I wanted to play with.” Luckily for Jones, he took that creative stance at precisely … Continue reading CMJ Top 250 Songs, 1979 – 1989, 97 – 95

FilmLeave a comment

From the Archive: The Temp

Dan Seeger

  I’m among those who try to avoid the term “guilty pleasure,” but there are times when it absolutely applies. This observation brings us straight to The Temp, one of the rare movies of my college radio reviewing tenure that I reported my viewpoint with a degree of sheepishness. But I also stand by this review. It’s been ages since I’ve seen it, but I know I had a blast watching this every time I stumbled upon a cable TV showing. Director Tom Holland has always approached his horror films with a certain cheekiness. Fright Night was a terrific vampire film … Continue reading From the Archive: The Temp