First Person Arts is a Philadelphia nonprofit organization that celebrates the power of the personal. Their storytelling, social impact, and festival programs reinforce their mission: everyone has a story to tell, and sharing these stories connects us with each other and the world. For 13 years they have been hosting StorySlams around the city, wherein local storytellers got head to head in front of a live audience and a panel of celebrity judges (full disclosure, we judged one of these suckers) for a chance to proceed to the next round. On Thursday at the Prince Music theater Winners of […]
STREET POET: Meet SEPTA’s Walt Whitman
Or maybe he’s the William Carlos Williams of SEPTA. Or the Carl Sandburg of SEPTA. Either way, his name is Mark Fuller and he gives mass transit rhyme and reason. From Scrapple TV, our partners in new media crime.
FROM THE VAULT: A Hard Night’s Day
Hy Lit and the Beatles, Convention Hall, Philadelphia, 1964 BY JONATHAN VALANIA It is precisely 9:36 p.m. in West Philadelphia on the second splendidly summery September night of 1964, and exactly six minutes ago everything suddenly changed. For teenage Philadelphia, the calendar just flipped, along with everyone’s wig, to a new era. It will be years before anyone fully understands all the far-reaching implications, but this much is indisputably true: The hazy, crazy 1960s have officially begun. OMIGOD, THEY’RE HERE! THEY’RE REALLY REALLY HERE! For months, their songs have blared from the tinny speakers of transistor radios, and they’ve stared […]
BEAM ME UP, SCOTTY: Live From Wizard World
We duly deputized the gang from Panic Hour as our Geek Space Correspondents and sent them to Wizard World to ask the really hard questions nobody has the guts to ask anymore. No geeks were hurt in the making of this video. Special thanks to Scrapple TV/Woodshop Films, our partners in new media crime.
ENDORSEMENT: N.A. Poe For City Council
Photo by LAUREN M. WAKSMAN Folks, we got trouble right here in Philadelphia. Trouble with a capital “T.” And that rhymes with “C” and that stands for CORRUPTION. All the major institutions in this city are wretched hives of patronage hires, hacks and shady backroom deals. There is zero accountability for the police, the unions, the politicians and don’t even get us started on the PPA. There is just one candidate running for City Council that aims to do something about it. His name is N. A. Poe and he is running on a platform of pulling back the curtains […]
LISTEN: The Flaming Side Of The Moon
THE FLAMING LIPS new digital release, FLAMING SIDE OF THE MOON is live now in digital form. Designed as an immersive companion piece to the original 1973 album, DARK SIDE OF THE MOON, listeners are encouraged to listen to the new LIPS album while listening to DARK SIDE at the same time. FLAMING SIDE OF THE MOON was also carefully crafted to sync up perfectly with the 1939 film, THE WIZARD OF OZ. For ideal listening conditions, fans are encouraged to seek out the original Alan Parsons’ engineered quadraphonic LP mix of DARK SIDE, but it will work with the album on any format. Available now through all participating digital outlets. […]
The FBI Labeled It’s A Wonderful Life Communist Propaganda Because It Makes The Rich Look Bad
The Communism begins at the 3:14 mark when all the people of Bedford Falls rally to help George Bailey — who sacrificed all his hopes and dreams to protect the working class of Bedford Falls from the from the Capitalist predations of vampire squids like Mr. Potter — in his hour of need because he was there for each and every one of them in their darkest hours. Sick, isn’t it? Like we always say, when you’re children ask you who the Tea Party Republicans are, tell them they are the people who root for Mr. Potter when they watch […]
MEDIA: The Least Trusted Name In News
Psyched to see our former colleague and Scrapple News anchorman AP Ticker, aka Frank Baker, on the cover of PW this week. AP Ticker is, among other things, The Second Most Interesting Man In The World (after the Dos Equis guy). PW: Sounds like Ticker is quite the unsung pioneer of television news. “He actually coined the phrase, ‘We’ll be right back,’” continues Baker. “Until then, it had been very awkward for anchormen. Because they would say, ‘We’re going to be here, but we’re going to a commercial now, but we’re not actually going to leave.’ It was very long. […]
ASK A WIZARD: Backstage w/ Wayne Coyne
In conjunction Scrapple TV, our partner in New Media crime, Phawker sat down with Flaming Lips mainman Wayne Coyne on his tour bus a few hours before their performance at the Festival Pier last month and rolled film. DISCUSSED: Sex, drugs, rock n’ roll, why the new Lips album is so goddamned dark, why he has Nick Cave’s blood, the story behind the Wayne Coyne Hand Grenade Incident, how he got Erykah Badu naked and covered in cum and glitter, and if he wasn’t the lead singer of the Flaming Lips what would have he done with his life. The […]
BANKSY: Syrian Rebels Shoot Down Dumbo
NEW YORK TIMES: The British street artist Banksy is apparently among the millions watching Syria’s war from afar, through glimpses of the fighting recorded on video and posted on YouTube. His latest video work is a brief parody of one of those clips released on Sunday as part of a series of works produced during a monthlong residency in New York that started last week. An excerpt from the video, showing actors dressed like Syrian rebels aiming a shoulder-fired missile at the sky, was uploaded to that Instagram account on Sunday, with a note reading: “I’m not posting any pictures […]
EXCERPT: A Confederacy Of Dunces
Artwork via CARGO COLLECTIVE PHILADELPHIA MAGAZINE: Reader commenting on Philly.com has also been around since the late ’90s, but it wasn’t until 2008, following years of internal deliberations and successive regime changes, that the site went all-in and began allowing readers to talk back at the bottom of every article. “Journalism had been a one-way conversation for too long,” says one Philly.com staffer. “It was a good idea to open the door and allow the public to start commenting on our work.” Well, on paper, maybe. In practice? Not so much. There was some recognition from the get-go that there […]
RAWK TAWK: Life According To Brother JT
BY JONATHAN VALANIA Garage-punk savant, drone-rock wizard, acid-dazed psychonaut, human ouija board, holy fool of the Internet — Brother JT is a man of many hats. He’s been a puppet, a poet, a pirate, a pawn and king. He’s been up and down and over and out — and he still really likes the LSD thing. (SEE Trippin’ Balls With Brother JT, his lysergic talk show on Scrapple TV) He’s come to tell us all that the emperor has no clothes, the sky is falling, God is great, we’re already dead, and yet despite all that life is beautiful. He’s […]
THE END: Doors Organist Ray Manzarek Dead At 74
Artwork by MDSigno NEW YORK TIMES: Mr. Manzarek founded the Doors in 1965 with the singer and lyricist Jim Morrison, whom he would describe decades later as “the personification of the Dionysian impulse each of us has inside.” They would go on to recruit the drummer John Densmore and the guitarist Robby Krieger. Mr. Manzarek played a crucial role in creating music that was hugely popular and widely imitated, selling tens of millions of albums. It was a lean, transparent sound that could be swinging, haunted, meditative, suspenseful or circuslike. The Doors’ songs were generally credited to the entire group. […]