ASSOCIATED PRESS: Allen Iverson’s retirement could be a short one. A person with knowledge of the talks says the Philadelphia 76ers have been approached about signing their former franchise superstar, and team management has held internal discussions about bringing Iverson back. The person, who spoke on condition of anonymity because talks have not been made public, says Iverson is among the free-agent candidates the Sixers are considering to replace injured point guard Lou Williams, who’s expected to miss eight weeks after jaw surgery. “I think we would look at all the options for sure, but nothing has really happened,” Peter […]
THE VICE GUIDE TO TRAVEL: Hipster At The Hajj
Vice founder Suroosh Alvi goes to Mecca with mom and dad. Takes camera. Fascinating, Captain.
RIP: Al Alberts Dead At 87
[Video: 6 year old Melissa Lynn sings “Diamonds are a Girl’s Best Friend” on Al Alberts Showcase – November 1985] INQUIRER: Mr. Alberts rose to fame in the 1950s as one of The Four Aces, whose hits included “Love Is a Many Splendored Thing,” “Stranger in Paradise” and the Jule Styne number “Three Coins in a Fountain.” But generations of Philadelphians knew him as “Uncle Al,” a tuxedoed fatherly figure with a white pompadour, blinding smile and infinite patience, as he gave screen time to young singers, hoofers, and comedians on Saturdays. The program started on Channel 48 in 1968 […]
CINEMA: Beyond Good And Evil
BAD LIEUTENANT: PORT OF CALL NEW ORLEANS (2009, directed by Werner Herzog, 121 minutes, U.S.) OH MY GOD (2009, directed by Paul Rodger, 93 minutes, U.S.) BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC If you think the Batman series has turned dark, you won’t believe the latest film franchise. Bad Lieutenant, the 1992 film gave Harvey Keitel a chance to wail naked as the drug-addicted criminal cop has returned, re-imagined by its producer Edward Pressman as a showcase for the long-dismantled weirdness of Nicholas Cage. Helmed by German director Werner Herzog, this new Bad Lieutenant allows the director to show another crazed […]
HOT DOCUMENT: Season’s Greetings From POTUS
jonathan — Tomorrow, Thanksgiving Day, Americans across the country will sit down together, count our blessings, and give thanks for our families and our loved ones. American families reflect the diversity of this great nation. No two are exactly alike, but there is a common thread they each share. Our families are bound together through times of joy and times of grief. They shape us, support us, instill the values that guide us as individuals, and make possible all that we achieve. So tomorrow, I’ll be giving thanks for my family — for all the wisdom, support, and love they […]
ALBUM REVIEW: Weezer Raditude
BY JAMIE DAVIS Weezer are a great band. Everyone knows it, and has ever since they heard “The Sweater Song” for the first time. Back then Weezer was good and nerdy, with awkward haircuts, blocky glasses, and just a general sense of being on the same side as your average teenage outcast. However, on their second-to-latest album The Red Album they abandoned their old geekdom completely, with songs like “The Greatest Man on Earth” and “Troublemaker” which may have been amazingly subtle skewering of hip-hop’s self-congratulatory lyric style, but I’m pretty sure they were just about how great frontman Rivers […]
NEWS CLUES: Like A Censored Ad For The Truth
$166 Million In The Hole, Washington Post Closes L.A., Chicago And NYC Bureaus The Washington Post, in a significant retrenchment, is closing its remaining U.S. bureaus outside the capital area. The six correspondents who work in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago will be offered assignments in Washington, while three news assistants will be let go. The money-saving moves, coming on the heels of four rounds of early-retirement buyouts and the closing or merging of several sections, are the clearest sign yet of the newspaper’s shrinking horizons in an era of diminished resources. “The fact is, we can effectively cover […]
NPR FOR THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When You Can’t
FRESH AIR You may recognize these names from recent headlines: Sen. John Ensign, Rep. Bart Stupak and Rep. Joe Pitts. Stupak and Pitts have become familiar names through the media’s health care overhaul coverage; their abortion funding amendment introduced an 11th-hour twist as the House of Representatives approached a vote on a landmark health care bill. Ensign was the focus of media attention over his affair with a campaign staffer. Just last night, a Nevada man disclosed that he found out about his wife’s affair with the state’s junior senator — his best friend — via a text message. The […]
TONITE: Get Your Freak Folk On
[Artwork by ALEX FINE] BY JONATHAN VALANIA It all started, for me anyway, at Brooke Sietinsons‘ walk-up loft/hobbit hole on Second Street, somewhere in that OK Corral-esque strip between the Standard Tap and the 700 Club. Even though she no longer lives there, the exact location will have to remain a secret because, technically speaking, L&I could still fine her for dispensing the Morning Glory seeds of Philly freak-folkdom without a permit. But the select initiates invited to these hash-pipe hootenannies — culled from some of the most remote and impenetrable redoubts of local bohemia — know where I’m talking […]
BREAKING: New Jersey Governor-Elect Subpoenaed By Jailed White Supremacist/FBI Informant
NJ.COM: A subpoena has been issued for Gov.-elect Chris Christie to appear next month at the federal trial of North Bergen Internet radio host and blogger Hal Turner [pictured, right]. Michael Orozco, Turner’s lawyer, said in an affadavit supporting the subpoena, that Christie, as the U.S. Attorney, knew that Turner was working with the FBI, Christie gave legal advice to the FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force regarding Turner, and issued a “Blanket Letter of Declination,” refusing to prosecute Turner. In late June Turner was charged with threatening federal judges in Chicago, stemming from an editorial on his Web site that […]
GLITTER AND DOOM: Phawker Photographer’s Work Included In The New Tom Waits Live Album
Yesterday, TOM WAITS released Glitter and Doom Live, a collection of outstanding live tracks from his 2008 sold out US and European tour. The two CD set contains 17 live recordings from ten nights along the tour including, Birmingham, Edinburgh, Tulsa, Knoxville, Atlanta, Paris, Milan, Jacksonville, Dublin and Columbus. The second CD entitled Tom Tales holds nearly 40 minutes of Waits quixotic ruminations on topics ranging from romantic spiders to injured vultures. The CD will also come with a booklet of live photos. One of those photos was snapped by Phawker contributing photographer Michael T. Regan, who we sent, along […]
AD BUST: This Is What Extinction Looks Like
[Video: Your flight has an impact. Plane Stupid’s new cinema ad, written and commissioned by creative agency Mother and made by production company Rattling Stick. Director Daniel Kleinman.] EDITOR’S NOTE: No polar bears were harmed in the making of this PSA. DISCOVER: In May the U.S. Department of the Interior classified polar bears as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. Documented declines in sea ice and anticipation of massive melting that threatens the bears’ habitat prompted the action. MORE RELATED: Unless the pace of global warming slows or stops, polar bears could disappear within a century, says a University of […]