FRESH AIR Comedian Richard Pryor’s legacy still reverberates nearly 10 years after his death. Pryor took the most difficult troubling aspects of his life and turned it into comedy. He talked about being black in ways that had never been done before in mainstream entertainment. And he was fearless and hilarious talking about race relations. “Pryor was so unusual in pioneering in that he really spoke for black, working-class communities across America,” Scott Saul tells Fresh Air’s Terry Gross. ” … As he goes through his career, you’ll have white and black sitting together in the audience — and he’s […]
BEING THERE: Modern Baseball @ The TLA
Photo by DYLAN LONG The TLA was jam packed last night for Philly’s very own Modern Baseball, homegrown pop-punksters known for their melodic leanings and turn-on-a-dime breakdowns. Opening up the sold-out show was a well-stacked lineup of buzzy bands, including Chicago pop-punkers Knuckle Puck and Beantown grinders Somos. Security had a busy night scooping up crowd surfers left and right while blaring, buzzsawing guitars had fists pumping skyward as the crowd’s energy continued to build. Brendan Lukens, Modern Baseball Jonah Hill-esque frontman, walked on stage a bit past 10, and cut to the quick: “Let’s just get started, we’re gonna […]
PAINT IT BLACK: Q&A With Paul Trynka, Author of “BRIAN JONES: The Making Of The Rolling Stones”
BY JONATHAN VALANIA A candid conversation with former MOJO editor Paul Trynka [pictured, below right] — author of IGGY POP: Open Up And Bleed and DAVID BOWIE: Star Man — about his new bio, BRIAN JONES: The Making Of The Rolling Stones. (The British version has a much edgier, and dare I say it Stonsier title, SYMPATHY FOR THE DEVIL: The Birth Of The Rolling Stones & The Death Of Brian Jones. Guess Random House thinks the devil doesn’t get his due in America. We’re inclined to disagree, but that’s a conversation for another time.) DISCUSSED: Blowjobs, pills, genius, […]
TONIGHT: Damsels In Distress
TRAFFIC IN SOULS (1913, directed by George Loane Tucker, 88 minutes, U.S.) WILD ORANGES (1924, directed by King Vidor, 88 minutes, U.S.) BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC Dr. McElhinney’s year-long survey of silent films continues with a silent double-bill featuring damsels in distress. First up, 1913’s lurid drama Traffic in Souls, in which a desperate woman recruits her policeman boyfriend to investigate her younger sister’s kidnapping by white slavers. Made two years before Birth of the Nation, there is no denying that Traffic is primitive cinema, with its camera staying nailed to the floor in long shots for the […]
NPR FOR THE DEAF: Fresh Air’s Word Of The Year
GEROFFREY NUNBERG: “Infobesity,” “lumbersexual,” “phablet.” As usual, the items that stand out as candidates for word of the year are like its biggest pop songs, catchy but ephemeral. But even a fleeting expression can sometimes encapsulate the zeitgeist. That’s why I’m nominating “God view” for the honor. It’s the term that the car service company Uber uses for a map view that shows them the locations of all the Uber cars in an area and silhouettes of the people who ordered them. The media seized on the term this fall when it came out that the company had been […]
JOHN LENNON: God
“God is a concept by which we measure our pain.” — JOHN LENNON NEW YORK DAILY NEWS: That summer in Breezy Point, when he was 18 and out of Madison High in Brooklyn, there was the Beatles on the radio at the beach through the hot days and on the jukebox through the nights in the Sugar Bowl and Kennedys. He was young and he let his hair grow and there were girls and it was the important part of life. Last year, Tony Palma even went to see Beatlemania. And now, last night, a 34-old man, he sat in […]
ORDINARY RENDITION: The CIA Kidnapped The 12 Year Old Daughter Of An Exiled Libyan Dissident & Handed Her Family Over To Gaddafi For Torture
GAWKER: Two very different flights landed at Mitiga military airport in Libya just over a decade ago. The first was organized by the CIA and MI6. On board were a family of six surrounded by guards, the frightened children separated from their parents, the father chained to a seat in a rear compartment with a needle stuck in his arm. The second flight, only a couple of days later, carried Tony Blair in comfort, on his way to shake hands and do business with Colonel Gaddafi. I know about the first flight, because I was one of the children. […]
BOOKS: Why Lena Dunham’s Memoir Is Everything That’s Wrong With Girls Like Lena Dunham
BY STEPHANIE SHAMP In the pursuit of not wasting my time, I generally only read memoirs that are: A. Recommended by a close friend B. Written past the age of 40 C. Dark with funny moments or funny with dark moments D. Profoundly moving I’m sorry to report that Not That Kind of Girl meets none of my basic requirements. Fact is, Lena Dunham’s life is just not that interesting. Born to two artists and raised in what is never directly said but implied to be a middle-class home with her younger sister in New York, Dunham is the […]
INCOMING: Authorized John Coltrane Documentary
COLTRANEFILM: Set against the social, political and cultural landscape of his times, the film will reveal the passions and demons that shaped Coltrane’s life, and explore why his music transcends the barriers of race, religion and age as it continues to inspire listeners around the world decades after his death. Utilizing never-before-seen Coltrane family home movies and audio recordings along with rare film and television appearances, Coltrane’s incredible story will be told by the people who know him best: his family, the musicians that worked with him, and the cultural icons who continue to draw inspiration from his fearless […]
HOT DOCUMENT: What Tolkien Told The Nazis When They Demanded To Know If He Was Jewish
Artwork by DONATO GIANCOLA 25 July 1938 20 Northmoor Road, Oxford Dear Sirs, Thank you for your letter. I regret that I am not clear as to what you intend by arisch. I am not of Aryan extraction: that is Indo-Iranian; as far as I am aware none of my ancestors spoke Hindustani, Persian, Gypsy, or any related dialects. But if I am to understand that you are enquiring whether I am of Jewish origin, I can only reply that I regret that I appear to have no ancestors of that gifted people. My great-great-grandfather came to England in the […]
‘RAPIST’: Bill Cosby’s Walk Of Fame Star Defaced
LOS ANGELES TIMES: Los Angeles police are investigating the vandalism of comedian Bill Cosby’s star on the iconic Hollywood Walk of Fame, which was marked with the word “rapist,” officials said. A photo of the vandalism surfaced on social media Friday morning, showing “rapist” scrawled across the star three times in marker. By midmorning, a cleaning crew was on scene. Ana Martinez, a spokeswoman for the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce, which helps oversee the Walk of Fame, said she became aware of the incident Friday morning. Martinez said the chamber also filed a police report. “The Hollywood Walk of […]
ARTSY: Q&A w/ Photographer Jessica Kourkounis
CLICK TO ENLARGE Jessica Kourkounis [pictured, below right, with chicken) is a Philadelphia-based photographer specializing in documentary, editorial and portraiture work. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, Time, The Art Economist and ESPN The Magazine. Her brother plays drums on many of the albums in your collection. Presumably. PHAWKER: How did you get interested in photography? What was the ‘Eureka!’ moment when you decided that this is what you wanted to do with your life? JESSICA KOURKOUNIS: I’ve been interested in photography for so long I honestly can’t even remember […]
THE IDIOT’S GUIDE TO SERIAL: Episode 10
BY MOLLY KASSEL This week on Serial, Sarah Koenig discusses two ideas; possible anti-Muslim discrimination in Adnan’s prosecution and conviction, and Cristina Gutierrez, Adnan’s defense attorney. Shamim, Adnan’s mom is clear; she believes Adnan’s guilty verdict is due to racism and discrimination on behalf of the state, prosecutors, and jury. When Adnan was arrested, the prosecutor argued against his bail while repeatedly referring to him as ‘Pakistani.’ The prosecutor said that his friends and family and surrounding community — which was helping him make bail and pay for a lawyer — would assist in his ‘getaway’ to Pakistan, where […]