Befitting a year in which Hollywood reeled in continuous confusion trying to adjust to the new reality of the post-COVID version of moviegoing, the Oscar nominations feel all over the place. There’s this wild convergence of old and new strewn … Continue reading All at Once — Thoughts on the Oscar Nominations
Near Dark (Kathryn Bigelow, 1987). It’s amusing now to see that Kathryn Bigelow filled her solo directorial debut with actors imported from Aliens, the action sequel made the previous years by her future husband, James Cameron. Especially since Cameron has … Continue reading Then Playing — Near Dark; Elvis; Amsterdam
89. The Police, Zenyatta Mondatta (1980) On the strength of their sophomore album, Reggatta De Blanc, the Police were a major rock act. That was undeniable. Even so, the band’s label, A&M Records, wasn’t satisfied. Although the trio had already … Continue reading College Countdown: CMJ Top 1000, 1979 – 1989 — #89 to #87
Gaining Accolades While Covering War Victims in Burkina Faso by Clair MacDougall In the regular Saturday Profile section of The New York Times, Clair MacDougall spotlight another journalist. Mariam Ouédraogo has earned several awards, including recently one the most prestigious, … Continue reading Outside Reading — The Truth Is Coming edition
When the first boygenius EP came out, in 2018, Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers, and Lucy Dacus were all up-and-comers. Baker and Dacus has two solo albums to their credit, and Bridgers had one. Since then, they’ve only commanded more attention … Continue reading This Week’s Model — boygenius, “$20”
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. Paul Smith hadn’t drawn that many comic books when he was … Continue reading My Misspent Youth — The Uncanny X-Men by Chris Claremont and Paul Smith
White Noise (Noah Baumbach, 2022). The only way this film can reasonable be deemed a success is by subscribing to the wholly unsupported premise that writer-director Noah Baumbach set out to prove that Don DeLillo’s landmark 1985 novel was accurately … Continue reading Then Playing — White Noise; Resurrection; The Eternal Daughter
These posts celebrate the movie trailers, movie posters, commercials, print ads, and other promotional material that stand as their own works of art. I mean it quite sincerely when I type that the last fifteen seconds of this TikTok video … Continue reading The Art of the Sell — Only Murders in the Building season three
This series of posts covers my long, beloved history interacting with the medium of radio, including the music that flowed through the airwaves. It was a bit of surprise to find myself back on the air at my beloved alma … Continue reading Radio Days — Then and Now: January 15, 2023
92. The Smithereens, Green Thoughts (1988) “When people write about things for a living, you like to write about them in a way that people understand them,” Pat DiNizio, the frontman and principal songwriter of the Smithereens, noted shortly after … Continue reading College Countdown: CMJ Top 1000, 1979 – 1989 — #92 to #90
