Author: Dan Seeger

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One for Friday: The Bears, “Fear is Never Boring”

Dan Seeger

There are plentiful reasons to long for the rock star life. For most, I suspect the main enticement are those that might show up in the most debauched sections of a memoir penned by one of the members of Kiss. I suppose there may have been a time when I would have eagerly agreed with that, but now that I’m older, I understand that hope is better directed at different glories. For example, if you have the ability and entitlement to demand anything, there are few better uses of that power than enlisting Mort Drucker to draw your album cover. … Continue reading One for Friday: The Bears, “Fear is Never Boring”

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Now Playing: Fences

Dan Seeger

“I once wrote this short story called ‘The Best Blues Singer in the World,’ and it went like this —’The streets that Balboa walked were his own private ocean, and Balboa was drowning.’ End of story. That says it all. Nothing else to say. I’ve been rewriting that same story over and over again. All my plays are rewriting that same story.” That quote is drawn from a Paris Review interview with August Wilson, published in 1999. As Wilson suggests, the single sentence short story does a better job than any plot recap ever could of describing what’s happening in … Continue reading Now Playing: Fences

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Laughing Matters: White Bear Mitsubishi commercial outtakes

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. Because as much as I want to reserve this feature for slinging profundities about the hidden insights of well-crafted comedy, or simply indulge in a little nostalgic reminiscing, sometimes I just have to concede that something I’ve stumbled upon made me laugh harder than I have in ages. And so we come to white bear on the ice. Previous entries in this series can … Continue reading Laughing Matters: White Bear Mitsubishi commercial outtakes

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Edgerton, Holmer, Kriegman and Steinberg, Moore, Øvredal

Dan Seeger

The Gift (Joel Edgerton, 2015). I find it amusing and even endearing that Joel Edgerton bypassed any potential inclinations to establish himself as a serious cinematic artist with his feature directorial debut and instead crafted a lurid little thriller not unlike those that routinely slunk into cineplexes throughout the nineteen-nineties. In The Gift, Simon (Jason Bateman) and Robyn (Rebecca Hall) move to Southern California because the former has taken a new job. While shopping for their new home, Simon and Rebecca bump into Gordo (Edgerton), an acquaintance from Simon’s high school days. Gordo insinuates himself into their lives — including … Continue reading Edgerton, Holmer, Kriegman and Steinberg, Moore, Øvredal

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Five Songs from 2016

Dan Seeger

There is a way we do these around these here digital parts. My list of the top ten albums of the year is followed by the sharing of a quintet of songs, probably not featured on one of those albums, that I think are also among the significant highlights of the music   year just past. I’m not claiming these are the five best singles or songs of the year. Instead, it’s simply a batch of tracks that, at one point or another, grabbed me and wouldn’t let go. Lucy Dacus, “I Don’t Wanna Be Funny Anymore” Dacus saunters through … Continue reading Five Songs from 2016

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College Countdown: CMJ Top 250 Songs, 1979 – 1989, 100 – 98

Dan Seeger

100. New Order, “The Perfect Kiss” It’s difficult to pin down precisely which version of the New Order song “The Perfect Kiss” sits at the momentous #100 position on this chart. On the 1985 album Low-Life, the song finishes its work in just under five minutes. There are a flurry of other edits of the track across different seven-inch singles, sometimes shaving as much as an additional minute off the song. Arguably the best known, though, is the iteration released as a twelve-inch single, that clocks in at a robust 8:46. And it’s a few second longer yet in the official … Continue reading College Countdown: CMJ Top 250 Songs, 1979 – 1989, 100 – 98

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One for Friday: Allo, Darlin’, “Will You Please Spend New Years with Me?”

Dan Seeger

I’m hardly the first or most eloquent person to observe that 2016 has been one kick in the teeth after another. It’s as if the historic event of the Chicago Cubs winning the World Series for the first time in over a century used up every drop of good karma the year had amassed leaving existential carnage everywhere else. As we close the calendar on these dismal twelve months (and head into a 2017 that, let’s be real, will get worse before it gets better), I’m craving something charming and a little on the gentle side. Hiding in a bedroom … Continue reading One for Friday: Allo, Darlin’, “Will You Please Spend New Years with Me?”

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Top Ten Albums of 2016

Dan Seeger

As per tradition in this digital space, the close of the calendar year means it’s time to reflect on the best music releases of the year. It’s been a while since I’ve been beholden by writing duties to an outside source, which was the initiating cause of my modern top ten albums lists, but I still do the best I can to keep up. I’ll acknowledge that it was more challenging than ever in 2016 to be comprehensive in my listening, and more than a few of the titles that make this tally have only making glancing appearances in my personal rotation. … Continue reading Top Ten Albums of 2016

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Now Playing: Jackie

Dan Seeger

Hardly a grizzled old soul at the age of thirty-five, Natalie Portman has nonetheless been working in film long enough — over twenty years — to have distinctive phases of her career. Without being precise about the timing of each shift (though I certainly could for anyone foolhardy and masochistic enough to ask me to), I’d say she’s already gone from child actor to precocious ingenue to adult actor. Presumptive as it might be to make too bold a declaration on the basis of a single performance, the new film Jackie could very mark the beginning of a convincing transformation into … Continue reading Now Playing: Jackie