Twenty years ago, I thought of the Coen brothers as cheeky titans of upending genres. They started their mutual career with a crime film, a broad comedy and a gangster picture, each of them adhering to the tropes of their … Continue reading Top Ten Movies of 2010 — Number Two
Beginning with a novel by Dennis Lehane that was adapted into a screenplay by Laeta Kalogridis, director Martin Scorsese built an intentional lurid psychological melodrama filled with existential trick shots and mental trap doors. After a decade of intensely focused … Continue reading Top Ten Movies of 2010 — Number Three
46. Slammin’ Watusis, Kings of Noise Some bands try to cultivate an air of mystery, intentionally remaining cryptic about the inspiration for their songs and sounds, insisting that they don’t want to influence the interpretations of individual fans or simply … Continue reading College Countdown: 90FM’s Top 90 of 1989, 46 and 45
I’ve had a little more modest output over at Spectrum Culture the past couple of weeks. I reviewed a Russian film called How I Ended This Summer about a burgeoning conflict between a couple of technicians at a remote weather station. Unfortunately, the frigid terrain they moved through looked a little too much like what was outside of our Carolina windows at the time. Luckily, that’s changed. Then this past week, I tapped into that distant part of me that stared down the copy of Dry that we received at the campus radio station nearly twenty years ago and tried … Continue reading Spectrum Check
In writing about my time at the college radio station, I focus almost exclusively on my interactions with the music piled into the library that lined the walls of our main studio. All those records and CDs contained of wealth of music that we called modern rock before begrudgingly starting to call it alternative. While WWSP 90FM had and has, to its credit, a stronger focus than most college radio stations, there was a significant amount of programming centered on different styles of music than that which topped the college charts. There were programs that made weekly forays into blues, … Continue reading One for Friday: Mel Tormé and George Shearing, “I’m Hip”
It can be reasonably argued that the most fragile points of a relationship occur at the beginning and the end. Of course, the end is obvious: whatever rifts and strains existed have reached the point of devastating rupture, and every … Continue reading Top Ten Movies of 2010 — Number Four
#45 — WarGames (John Badham, 1983) I completely understand that a multitude of factors are weighed when determining the release dates of films. The timing of their respective arrivals on on screens nationwide only has so much to do with the … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 80s — Number Forty-Five
I’m not sure if there was ever a time when the general rule of thumb with sequels didn’t mandate adjusting expectations downward in rough accordance with the increasing number of installments. Even so, as the franchise mentality has almost entirely … Continue reading Top Ten Movies of 2010 — Number Five
An endlessly spinning top makes for about as fine a metaphor as could be cooked up for Christopher Nolan’s wildly imaginative, audaciously entertaining film about transforming the human subconscious into a playground for all manner of skulduggery. Inception is a … Continue reading Top Ten Movies of 2010 — Number Six
48. F Machine, Here Comes the 21st Century That performer that goes by the moniker Simon F was part of the mid-eighties band Interferon, which had a minor success or two before parting ways. He proceeded to release a couple … Continue reading College Countdown: 90FM’s Top 90 of 1989, 48 and 47
