The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test (Bantam, 1968, reprinted 1999) BY MAVIS LINNEMANN BOOK CRITIC “You’re either on the bus, or off the bus,” Ken Kesey chants. On the bus. Off the bus. With the Merry Pranksters. Or with the squares. On the bus. Off the bus. This phrase — a meaty reality bite all by itself, repeated like a mantra throughout the book — marks the metaphysical divide that is at the center of Tom Wolfe’s raw account of the psychedelic counterculture in The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, the legendary New Journalism chronicle of Ken Kesey (author of “One […]
NICK CAVE & THE BAD SEEDS: Stagger Lee
WARNING: Adult language, explicitly articulated sex and violence and general whiteboy badass-ness.
NPR FOR THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When You Can’t
FRESH AIR With his band the MGs, Booker T. Jones created the classic instrumental “Green Onions.” But they were also the studio band for Stax Records, making music with soul artists such as Otis Redding, Ray Charles and Wilson Pickett. A new two-CD box set features Stax highlights and Booker T. is now back on tour. RADIO TIMES AYAAN HIRSI-ALI is an outspoken critic of Islam and defender of women?s rights. Her life story is detailed in her new memoir Infidel. In 2004, with director Theo van Gogh, she made Submission, a film about the oppression of women in conservative […]
HIZZONER ’07: Fattah Leading In Tribune Poll
PHILADELPHIA, March 26 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — A recent poll among 400 registered African-American voters who said they planned to vote in the city of Philadelphia’s May 2007 Democratic Primary Election has provided evidence that black voters still rank Chaka Fattah first (27 %), and Dwight Evans second (18%), but that Tom Knox (now at 14%), has moved past Michael Nutter (9%) and Bob Brady (8%), since October 26-29, 2006, when the poll was last taken. While he still maintains a lead position among black voters, Fattah’s support has decreased from 33 percent to 27 percent; Evans and Brady have each increased […]
GUNCRAZY: Mother Of Four Shot In The Head
Cops said the woman had been shot in the back of the head and pronounced dead at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania shortly after 5 p.m. Police weren’t able to release the woman’s name, but a woman at the scene who claimed to be the victim’s aunt identified her as Yvonne Myrich. A 19-year-old was shot in the leg and taken to Mercy Hospital, where he was listed in stable condition. A man in his 30s was shot in the chest and taken to HUP, where he was listed in extremely critical condition. A 17-year-old male was shot […]
UNTITLED
ASSOCIATED PRESS: Roadside bombs killed five American soldiers in Iraq on Sunday, including four in a single strike in the volatile province of Diyala, northeast of the capital, the military said.
REVIEW: THE DEAD GIRL
(2007, directed by Karen Moncrieff, 85 min., U.S.) BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC This past week I happened to see Rosanna Arquette’s 2002 film Searching For Debra Winger, a star-filled documentary in which a wide array of film actresses talk about the joys and heartaches of being a woman in the business. Marcia Gay Harden is among the actresses rightfully bemoaning the dearth of juicy roles for women, and a film like Karen Moncrieff‘s The Dead Girl, an anthology film with roles for eight actresses (includingt Harden), is just the sort of worthy project these women were imagining.Following five troubled […]
SONIC BOOM: Hypnogoogia
At JBs April 2nd.
UN-AMERICAN: NYC Police Spying Before 2004 RNC Convention Curiously Similar To Philly Police Spying Before 2000 RNC Convention
March 25, 2007 City Police Spied Broadly Before G.O.P. Convention By JIM DWYER NEW YORK TIMES For at least a year before the 2004 Republican National Convention, teams of undercover New York City police officers traveled to cities across the country, Canada and Europe to conduct covert observations of people who planned to protest at the convention, according to police records and interviews. From Albuquerque to Montreal, San Francisco to Miami, undercover New York police officers attended meetings of political groups, posing as sympathizers or fellow activists, the records show. They made friends, shared meals, swapped e-mail messages and then […]
PHILLY MAG: Looking For Rosebud In The Winter Of Our Dissed Content
Press Lord 2.0 Can a self-made ad man with big ideas and a Walter Annenberg fascination save the Inquirer and Daily News? Maybe. But when Brian Tierney’s finished, the newspaper business may never be the same By Jason Fagone THEY HAD LET THE PLACE GO TO HELL. Tierney could see it the first day he walked in the door. In the lobby alone, the paint was peeling and the floor was dirty. The reception desk was plated with metal that gave off a chilly, clinical vibe. Off in the corner was an old Panasonic on a TV cart, an orange […]
TODAY I…GOT SHOT AT
“Today I saw…” is a series of nonfiction shorts based on my experiences as a caseworker serving formerly homeless families now living in North and West Philadelphia. I decided not long after starting the job that I was seeing so many fascinating and disturbing things in the city’s poorest neighborhoods that I needed to start cataloging them. I hope this bi-weekly column serves as a record of a side of the city that many Philadelphians don’t come in contact with on a daily basis. I want to capture moments not frequently covered by the local media, which tends to […]
WASHINGTON POST Runs John Doe Editorial From Patriot Act Victim
[Excerpted from The Washington Post] My National Security Letter Gag Order BY JOHN DOE Friday, March 23, 2007; Page A17 The Justice Department’s inspector general revealed on March 9 that the FBI has been systematically abusing one of the most controversial provisions of the USA Patriot Act: the expanded power to issue “national security letters.” It no doubt surprised most Americans to learn that between 2003 and 2005 the FBI issued more than 140,000 specific demands under this provision — demands issued without a showing of probable cause or prior judicial approval — to obtain potentially sensitive information about U.S. […]
PREVUE: One Man’s Quest To Visit EVERY Starbucks On Earth
Starbucking, SEE ALSO Myth Of Sisyphus [Hat tip to FreeIndie]