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. Happy Labor Day, friends! … Continue reading Laughing Matters — Lisa Simpson, “Union Strike Folk Song”
6. The Clash, “Rock the Casbah” In many respects, “Rock the Casbah” was the beginning of the end for the Clash. The third single off the of the album Combat Rock, which was released in 1982, “Rock the Casbah” first … Continue reading College Countdown: CMJ Top 250 Songs, 1979 – 1989, 6
In this space, I tend to venerate the music spun with vigor on college radio during my first year as a member of the brethren of left of the dial broadcasters. I think that’s fairly understandable. Most music fans cling … Continue reading One for Friday: The Triffids, “Holy Water”
In November, Randy Newman will turn seventy-four years old. Despite his advancing years, he sounds exactly the same as he always has in his latest full-length release, Dark Matter, his eleventh studio album. That’s not a testament to virile youthfulness … Continue reading The New Releases Shelf: Dark Matter
7. Siouxsie and the Banshees, “Peek-A-Boo” One of the biggest hits ever crafted by Siouxsie and the Banshees began as a mistake. Following a string of splendid studio efforts through the the late-nineteen-seventies and the first half of the eighties, … Continue reading College Countdown: CMJ Top 250 Songs, 1979 – 1989, 7
Some songs that arrived at my college radio station had a remarkable number of attributes, all converging to make it nearly irresistible to the eager young music fans that took turns on the airwaves. “Religion Ruined My Life,” from the … Continue reading One for Friday — Brian Ritchie, “Religion Ruined My Life”
When I first heard songs from Reflektor, the fourth album from Arcade Fire, I was left a little cold. The long run-up to that album, the Montreal band’s follow-up to the surprise Grammy winner The Suburbs, doled out songs one … Continue reading The New Releases Shelf: Everything Now
8. Thomas Dolby, “She Blinded Me with Science” Ray Milton Dolby was born in Portland, Oregon, in 1933. A sound engineer by training and by trade, Dolby spent the early nineteen-sixties working as a technical advisor for the United Nations, … Continue reading College Countdown: CMJ Top 250 Songs, 1979 – 1989, 8
On this Saturday, I am giving myself over to the cultural sensation of our time. so I reach back to the little diversion I once cooked up (or co-opted, anyway) for a weekly bit of relief at the end of … Continue reading From the Archive — Five for Friday, Let’s Put on a Show! edition
One of the gifts of discovering a deep and abiding love of music right around the time a necessary transition to adulthood looms is the sudden access to a dazzling universe of sonic art that can provide a vocabulary of … Continue reading One for Friday: The Weakerthans, “Tournament of Hearts”
Coffee for Two 