[Photo by Allauddin Khan/Associated Press] ASSOCIATED PRESS: Taliban insurgents dug a more than 1,050-foot (320-meter) tunnel underground and into the main jail in Kandahar city and whisked out more than 450 prisoners, most of whom were Taliban fighters, officials and the insurgents said Monday. The massive jailbreak overnight in Afghanistan’s second-largest city serves as a reminder of the Afghan government’s continuing weakness in the south, despite an influx of international troops, funding and advisers. Kandahar city, in particular, has been a focus of the international effort to establish a strong Afghan government presence in former Taliban strongholds. The 1,200-inmate Sarposa […]
WORTH REPEATING: Sebastian Junger’s Tribute To Tim Hetherington, His Restrepo Co-Director
“Tim*, man, what can I say? For the first few hours, the stories were confused enough that I could imagine maybe none of them were true, but they finally settled into one brief, brutal narrative: While covering rebel forces in the city of Misrata, Libya, you got hit by a piece of shrapnel and bled to death on the way to the clinic. You couldn’t have known this, but your fellow photographer Chris Hondros would die later that evening. I’m picturing you in the back of a pickup truck with your three wounded colleagues. There are young men with bandannas […]
SIDEWALKING: Madonna Without Child
13th & Locust, 12:51 PM by JONATHAN VALANIA
THE DEENEY BEAST: PCP, Not Just For Kicking Out The Back Windows Of Cop Cars Anymore
THE DAILY BEAST: During its heyday in the ‘70s and early ‘80s, PCP was associated with biker gangs and horror stories in the press detailing catastrophically bad trips resulting in mental breakdown and bodily injury. But today, the drug’s spread more closely resembles that of crack-cocaine: poor, inner-city kids looking for an initially affordable, easy-to-obtain high. Philadelphia’s notorious Badlands, primarily a Latin barrio comprised of narrow streets lined with ailing two-story brick row homes, has been the epicenter of the city’s drug trade for decades. Today, the neighborhood is drenched in wet, and the corners where wet sells are some […]
EARLY WORD: Return Of The Red-Haired Stranger
Willie Nelson’s Country Throwdown Tour 2011 ( www.countrythrowdown.com) will make a highly anticipated stop in Philadelphia on May 27th when eight top country acts and six emerging singer/songwriters take the stage at The Mann for a one-of-a-kind-festival experience. The only tour of its kind in the world of country music, Willie Nelson’s Country Throwdown Tour 2011 features eight headliners, including Willie Nelson, Jamey Johnson, Randy Houser, Lee Brice, Brantley Gilbert, Craig Campbell, Lukas Nelson & Promise of the Real. Recently added to the tour, Drake White, is sure to entertain with his signature freestyle twist on original songs, ad-libs and […]
New Study Suggests That Legalizing Gay Marriage Would Lead To More Gays Being Married
[via Prose Before Hos]
CINEMA: Elephant’s Memory
WATER FOR ELEPHANTS (2011, directed by Francis Lawrence, 122 minutes, U.S.) BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC If you thought a seen-it-all big city film critic was too cynical to enjoy a film adaptation of Sara Gruen ‘s Depression-era circus romance Water For Elephants, you would be mistaken. A romantic triangle between a circus owner, his star attraction wife, and an Ivy-League-drop-out turned roustabout is just the sort of old-fashioned hokum that Hollywood once did best. There was every reason to believe that movie stars Reese Witherspoon and Edward the Vampire from Twilight could bring their sizable star power to make […]
THRONE UP: Stop The Wedding, I’m Gonna Be Sick!
BY REBECCA GOODACRE ROYAL SUBJECT It is officially a week until the Royal Wedding. Well, bloody hell, I better get out my hand-held union jack flags and commemorative china. My crumpets always taste so much better eaten off the smarmy faces of two young future monarchs. And the date of the big day hasn’t really been mentioned much in the media (sarcasm alert), so it’s useful to have it painted onto my tea-cup, just so I can be reminded with every sip exactly when all my taxes are being spent on four tons of roses and a glass carriage. Yes, […]
We Know It’s Only Rock N’ Roll But We Like It
HIGH BEAM: Iron & Wine, Electric Factory, last night by JONATHAN VALANIA
SH*T MY UNCLE SAYS: Cruel & Unusual Cost-Cutting
EDITOR’S NOTE: William C. Henry is better known to me as ‘Uncle Bill.’ I’ve invited him to weigh in from time to time on whatever is getting his goat at the moment. BY WILLIAM C. HENRY If you’ve read any of my commentaries you know that I’m no shrinking violet (Google it) when it comes to politics, but I’m thinking it would probably be best if I exceed the recommended dosage of my hypertension meds for this one. Let me begin by saying that what we’ve got here, in the immortal words of Strother Martin, isn’t just “failure to communicate.” […]
PAPERBOY: Slow-Jamming The Alt-Weeklies
BY DAVE ALLEN Like time, news waits for no man. Keeping up with the funny papers has always been an all-day job, even in the pre-Internets era. These days, however, it’s a two-man job. That’s right, these days you need someone to do your reading for you, or risk falling hopelessly behind and, as a result, increasing your chances of dying lonely and somewhat bitter. That’s why every week PAPERBOY does your alt-weekly reading for you. We pore over those time-consuming cover stories and give you the takeaway, suss out the cover art, warn you off the ink-wasters and steer […]
SONG OF THE MOMENT: “Apothecary Love”
This old-timey charmer from The Low Anthem’s drop-dead gorgeous Smart Flesh, the just-released follow-up to 2009’s Oh My God, Charlie Darwin, has been making me smile for weeks. It vibes like a summery cross between The Band’s Music From Big Pink and Beck’s Mutations — all mournful, moonlit country lilt and coal mountain melody waltzing matilda across the fruited plains and purple mountain majesties of the warm, narcotic American night. Its like old time country lemonade for your ears. The singer sounds like an Appalachian Cat Stevens telling it on the mountain, the harmonica wheezes like a far-off train whistle […]
RIP: TV On The Radio Bassist Dead At 36
TV ON THE RADIO: We are very sad to announce the death of our beloved friend and band mate, Gerard Smith, following a courageous fight against lung cancer. Gerard passed away the morning of April 20th, 2011. We will miss him terribly. MORE THE GUARDIAN: I only ever met TV on the Radio‘s Gerard Smith once. It was three years ago in the Muzak-scented lobby of a west London hotel. Smith chucked the odd word into my hour-long interview with the band, but it was only when the conversation wandered towards the twin behemoths of Funkadelic and Led Zeppelin that […]