Real Journalism written by people
Would you let a Butthole Surfer babysit your tween? That seemed to be the question – more of a dare, really – implicit in the advance hype for Gibby Haynes’s first foray into fiction. Not just fiction, mind you. The man who once sang for the most dangerous band in rock had penned a novel for the young adult market, […]
After two very slow pieces for strings, organ and accordion – of which he was not a part – on a December night at Roulette in Downtown Brooklyn, Mick Barr walked onstage gripping his guitar by the neck and addressed the audience with a slight grin, saying simply, “Ear plugs?” He tested the amp with a quick strum, sounding more […]
I arrive out of the concrete cold into the warm foyer of the tabernacle. My pals Tom and Joe are deep in conversation. I catch the end of the back and forth and hear “the Blood of Christ.” I query what this is all about. I am let into the secret and told that they are thinking of an appropriate […]
The first time I saw Hugh Pool perform, I was deep in conversation with an old friend, Tom Vaught, at the enchanting but since departed Lakeside Lounge. Suddenly from the stage, a long-haired, National guitar-picking, slide-screaming, harmonica-through-amplifier, screeching force came soaring like a nip-soaked cat on fire in a bag filled with rabid dogs on acid. Our jaws became acquainted […]
In this giant international city where supposedly everything is available 24 hours a day, there is one thing that’s in short supply: live blues. Where to go to hear the blues? B.B. King’s Blues Club closed in April, 2018, and Hank’s Saloon is now interred in the cemetery. You can try to stroll by 55 Bar on Christopher Street and […]
In my wayward youth, before I accidentally found my true mission in life, I applied for a job at ASCAP – the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers. The position was Deputy Under Assistant to the Radio Associate or some such ridiculous title. The work required successful applicants to tune across the AM/FM dials and identify the music they […]
The recent death of Juice WRLD (pronounced “juice world”) is yet another famous causuality by drug abuse. Jarad Anthony Higgins, age 21, was a gifted and rising musician, praised critically and supported by devoted listeners. During his short career, Juice WRLD would release hit songs like “Lucid Dreams” (peaking at number 2 on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart), complete an international […]
On November 21, Robyn Hitchcock performed two sets at Murmrr, a Brooklyn synagogue which periodically programs cutting-edge folk and rock. The show was originally meant to be a double bill with Tanya Donnelly (Throwing Muses, The Breeders, Belly) opening, but for reasons unclear, she was unable to appear. Though Donnelly was missed, fans of Hitchcock were able to enjoy even […]
Among the most powerful recent exhibitions I’ve visited in the city, Shahidul Alam: Truth to Power at the Rubin Museum on West 17th Street chronicles the four-decade career of the prolific Bangladeshi photographer, writer, and activist Shahidul Alam. The first major U.S. museum retrospective of his work, the exhibition features both film and digital photography, Alam’s writing, contact sheets, and […]
Horror Stories, the memoir by recording artist Liz Phair, is not a bad book, but it’s an odd one with which to have made her debut as a writer, and it’s certainly not the one fans of her music will wish she’d have written. Despite Phair’s assertion that it’s her “effort to slow everything down and take a look at […]
