ST. VINCENT Actor (4AD) Texas native Annie Clark, AKA St. Vincent, has come a long way since her departure from The Polyphonic Spree, having won over critics’ hearts and minds at this year’s SXSW festival, and releasing Actor, her highly anticipated and justifiably hyped sophomore effort. Critics have described Actor as the captivating soundtrack to some long lost Disney film that never existed, and after a few listens I am inclined to agree. More accurately, I would argue that Actor‘s seamless wedding of tormented lyrics to sweeping symphonic arrangements is closer to the enchanted melancholia vibe of a Tim Burton […]
YOU HEARD IT HERE FIRST: Crips! Bloods! Oh My!
ASSOCIATED PRESS: A new report shows the notorious Bloods street gang has a firm grip on the New Jersey prison system. The State Commission of Investigation report released today shows the Bloods and other street gangs run their crime operations from inside prisons with ease. The report shows drugs and smuggled cell phones are plentiful. The panel calls for statewide reforms, including better security inside prisons and stronger management of inmates’ money. The commission says inmates who want to take advantage of rehabilitation services and re-entry programs deserve protection against gang violence. MORE PREVIOUSLY ON PHAWKER: Last summer a former […]
HEAR YE: WILCO The Album
Congratulations! If you are reading this YOU ARE OUR 1,022,106th CUSTOMER! That’s right, Phawker has hit the big M! We could not be more proud or horny! And we couldn’t have done it without you! To celebrate, let’s all make love in London tonight listen to the new Wilco album on Phawker Radio! Comes out June 30th! Y’all come back now, ya hear?!? And please hit REFRESH on your way out. More Wilco stuff after the jump…
KILLADELPHIA: Two Shot Dead Overnight, Phila. Detective Beaten And Mugged On Ben Franklin Bridge
ASSOCIATED PRESS: Police say a Philadelphia homicide detective was jogging on the Benjamin Franklin Bridge when she was mugged by a man on a bicycle. Officials say the 28-year-old detective encountered the man on the bridge between Philadelphia and Camden, N.J., early Tuesday. He snatched a gold chain from her neck and threw her cell phone in the Delaware River. Police say the two struggled, and the man produced a handgun and struck the policewoman several times on the head. MORE RELATED: Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell has resigned as chairman of the Delaware River Port Authority, the two-state agency that […]
THE EARLY WORD: I Hear A Darkness
NEW YORKER: [Will] Oldham has been releasing records for fifteen years, though almost never under his own name. His first recordings were credited to Palace Brothers, a name inspired by John Steinbeck’s “Cannery Row”—in which the characters’ makeshift home is known as the Palace Flophouse—and by close-harmony duos such as the Louvin Brothers, who helped expand the scope of early country music, and the Everly Brothers, whose hits from half a century ago underscored the link between country music and early rock and roll. Oldham was a student of music history, clearly, but he never sounded studious. He had an […]
SATIRE: Inky Names Michael Vick Pet Care Columnist
[via BRENDAN CALLING] PHILADELPHIA – The publisher of The Philadelphia Inquirer is defending his decision to make former football player Michael Vick a regular columnist who will write about breeding and raising dogs. Vick was the “the key figure” of an extensive unlawful interstate dogfighting ring operating over a period of five years that critics call cruelty to animals. One critic of the Inquirer’s Vick columns says it’s like having O.J. Simpson write about the criminal justice system. Inquirer Publisher Brian Tierney says that’s a silly comparison. He says Simpson has been found liable for wrongful death of a human […]
TONITE: Look! Up In The Sky! It’s A Bird! It’s A Plane!
No, It’s…Minotaur! An Air Force Minotaur 1 rocket will be launched from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia on Tuesday, May 19th, between 735PM and 1130PM. This rocket may be visible by residents in the Eastern United States as a bright light heading to the southeast from the mid-Atlantic coast. Given the weather forecast calls for clear skies; NASA believes it may be possible for this event to be seen from Philadelphia. [via CITY OF PHILADELPHIA ALERT SYSTEM]
ST. VINCENT: Actor Out Of Work
At First Unitarian Thursday with Pattern Is Movement.
HOT DOC: Disbarment Complaint Against John Yoo
NEW YORK TIMES: A coalition of left-wing advocacy groups filed legal ethics complaints on Monday against 12 former Bush administration lawyers, including three United States attorneys general, whom the groups accuse of helping to justify torture. The coalition, called Velvet Revolution, asked the bar associations in four states and the District of Columbia to disbar the lawyers, saying their actions violated the rules of professional responsibility by approving interrogation methods, including waterboarding, that constituted illegal torture. By writing or approving legal opinions justifying such methods, the advocates say, the Bush administration lawyers violated the Geneva Conventions, the Convention Against Torture […]
THIS JUST IN: Fiery Furnaces At Kung Fu Necktie 6/10
Picture unrelated.
CONCERT REVIEW: As Nasty As She Wants To Be
[Painting by WILHELM SASNAL] BY JONATHAN VALANIA FOR THE INQUIRER If Peaches never existed, she would have surely invented herself. In fact, that’s exactly how Merrill Beth Nisker, a 41-year-old former drama teacher from Ontario, transformed into Peaches, electroclash’s preeminent erotic provocateur/party animal. For the last 10 years, she’s been transgressing the boundaries of good taste and common decency with album titles like Impeach My Bush and trashy retrofitted 80s dance music that advocates fornication as the palliative cure for the pain and boredom of modern existence. In the process, she has built a swelling cult of gender freaks, hipster […]
YOO HOOEY: Inky’s Harold Jackson And Daily News’ Will Bunch Trade Blows Over ‘Torture Guy’ Editorialist
HAROLD JACKSON: Paris. Yes, the one in France. That’s the farthest point from which The Inquirer received e-mails protesting our contract with John Yoo to write a monthly column, which mostly centers on legal topics. The hundreds of e-mails received are a testament to the power of the blogosphere, and of its superiority to newspapers in getting the word out about, well, about anything. But I’ll save my whining about the murky future of my preferred vehicle of employment for a later date. Obviously, people would prefer that I talk about Yoo, the former Bush Justice Department official who penned memos […]
WHERE’S THE BEEF: Inquirer Puff Piece On Glenn Beck Long On Froth, Short On Questioning All The Hateful Moronic Things He Has Said Over The Years
UPDATE: Glenn Beck Puff Piece Author John Timpane Is Live Chatting With Readers RIGHT NOW! INQUIRER PUFF PIECE ABOUT GLENN BECK: Glenn Beck is dressed to kill. His show on Fox News hits in about an hour, and he’s ready in black suit, pink shirt, maroon tie — and black Converse Chuck Taylor high-top sneakers, no laces. The Chucks, like Beck himself, are upmarket with a dash of irreverence.Depending on who’s talking, Beck, 45, is a hero, maniac, lightning rod. He calls himself “a guy on the radio bus.” That bumpy ride took him through Philadelphia and WPHT-AM (1210), where […]