Spectrum Check

This week I took my first crack at the Revisit feature over on the music side of things, which proved to be far more difficult for me. I initially thought I’d write about R.E.M.’s Out of Time this year stands as the twentieth anniversary of its release and, despite being a major success, it seems to be one of the forgotten albums by the band. I thought it would be interesting to give it a fresh listen, separated from the saturation play it experienced at my college radio station upon release. I may still try writing that piece at some … Continue reading Spectrum Check

One for Friday: Couch Flambeau, “Models”

There were bands at our college radio station that everyone was practically mandated to know. I’m not referring to the titans of the college radio charts at the time–R.E.M., The Cure, The Replacements, bands like that–as much as those otherwise obscure acts that were represented on our station playlists like they were among the most vaunted figures in the college rock canon. Usually this developed because one person discovered a band and started pushing it on other DJs like the opportunity to charge for future necessary doses was a given. Often, it was an attitude that the band had that … Continue reading One for Friday: Couch Flambeau, “Models”

Great Moments in Literature

“‘No, I am not a man who harbors romantic ideas about the extension of the spirit. It’s something I’d like to think I taught my sons, to partake of the physical world while it is yours to take, because that is one meaning of life with which no one can argue. To taste, to touch, to breathe in, to eat and stuff yourself–all the rest, all that takes place in the heart and mind lives in the shadow of uncertainty. But the lesson didn’t come easily to you, and you never accepted it in the end. You shot yourself in … Continue reading Great Moments in Literature

Spectrum Check

This week, I reviewed a new film that stars John Hawkes as artist Stan Herd. Hawkes is good as always; the movie has some issues. I also contributed an entry to this week’s List Inconsequential, which focused on the best film adaptations of William Shakespeare’s works. The super-secret, DVD commentary track backstory on this one is that it was initially intended to be the best and the worst of Shakespeare adaptations, but everyone wanted to write about their favorites. I’ve actually had a hard time thinking of a film bad enough to be singled out for the that sort of … Continue reading Spectrum Check