#26 — Close Encounters of the Third Kind (Steven Spielberg, 1977) In 1990, film critics Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert took a break from flinging their thumbs around in judgment and created a television special called The Future of the … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 70s — Number Twenty-Six
Thanks to the magic of interweb research, I can pinpoint my discovery of Michael Chabon down to the exact date. When I started worked in commercial radio in the mid-nineteen-nineties, one of the little oddities I discovered was the presence … Continue reading My Writers: Michael Chabon
24. Ladytron, 604 “Ladytron” is the second track on the 1972 self-titled debut album from Roxy Music. Written by Bryan Ferry, the song finds the singer in full-on seduction mode, which isn’t surprising considering that’s basically his default position. When … Continue reading College Countdown: CMJ Top 50 Albums of 2001, 24 and 23
This week my writerly paw prints were in a few different corners of Spectrum Culture. First, I had a music review of a new reunion album, which I openly acknowledged that I was selecting because I’m one of the older guys on the staff. I usually approach such releases with a hearty dose of skepticism, although I’ve been pleasantly surprised in the past. Not this time around, as my honest assessment was fairly dire, an especially unpleasant scenario given that the band in question has at least one true classic to their credit. On the film side, I reviewed the … Continue reading Spectrum Check
I cannot overemphasize how wondrous it was for me to discover any music that existed outside of the monolithic wall of derivative grunge that dominated alternative radio in the mid-nineties. So if I found my way to a charming bit of understated indie pop, couching somewhat humorous lyrics in a lovely wistfulness–completely different from the anguished bravado that Pearl Jam made the norm–I was certainly going to embrace it. I may not be able to play it on the radio, thanks to our impenetrable playlists, but that’s what my home stereo and all the mix tapes manufactured in its dual … Continue reading One for Friday: Pee Shy, “Little Dudes”
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 sadly monochromatic taste as a comic book reader when … Continue reading My Misspent Youth: Eightball by Daniel Clowes
#27 — Nashville (Robert Altman, 1975) What does it say about the difference between European cinema, I wonder, that there’s such a pronounced fundamental difference between the two directors, roughly contemporaries, from each respective region that are best suited to having … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 70s — Number Twenty-Seven
These posts are about the songs that can accurately claim to crossed the key line of chart success, becoming Top 40 hits on Billboard, but just barely. Every song featured in this series peaked at number 40. Coldplay was already a significant band on the pop culture firmament when they released their fourth studio album, Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends, in the summer of 2008, in part because they had spent years signalling with all their collective being that they were prepared to be the next iteration of U2. What’s more, they were clearly ready to … Continue reading Top 40 Smash Taps: “Violet Hill” and “Lost!”
Just over twenty-five years into their existence as Pixar and over fifteen years since they shifted the foundations of film with Toy Story, the computer animation studio that can make as much of a claim towards auteurship as any major … Continue reading I walked away from everyone I know, I looked around and thought, This must be what it’s like to be alone
26. The Living End, Roll On In tracking through the top college albums of 2001, I’ve spent a lot of words–an embarrassing amount of them, perhaps–detailing how poorly informed I was about many artists before personally beginning the rediscovery process … Continue reading College Countdown: CMJ Top 50 Albums of 2001, 26 and 25
