This is what happens when you try to lip read a man that has no lips — or mortal soul.
FOO FIGHTERS: “For the millionth time we’re not breaking up. And nobody’s going fucking solo!”
RS: Foo Fighters breakup speculation abound this week after the band’s mysterious tweet on Tuesday stated there would be an “official announcement tomorrow night. Stay tuned.” The tweet followed a Page Six report from Monday that claimed there was “tension” between bandmates Dave Grohl and Taylor Hawkins and that Grohl may be going solo, which likely helped ignite the rumors. Despite the report and Grohl’s performance sans his bandmates at the Oscars last Sunday, Foo Fighters fans can rest easy as the tease was simply to put the breakup rumors to rest via the release of a clever video they shared via an “Official […]
CINEMA: Black Is the Color Of My True Love’s Hair
EW: Nina, the long-awaited and quite controversial Nina Simone biopic starring Zoe Saldana, is finally becoming a reality: On Tuesday, EW revealed the film’s poster and release date, and today, audiences get their first look at Nina’s trailer. The film follows Simone through her legendary career as an American vocalist, particularly her years living in isolation in France after finding it difficult to balance her singing career with her political activism. In France, she meets the man who will become her assistant-turned-manager, Clifton Henderson (Selma’s David Oyelowo). Nina is directed by first-timer Cynthia Mort. Controversy has plagued the film for years: Back in 2010, Mary J. Blige was […]
WORTH REPEATING: Trumpism & Its Discontents
ANDREW BACEVICH: Whether or not Donald Trump ultimately succeeds in winning the White House, historians are likely to rank him as the most consequential presidential candidate of at least the past half-century. He has already transformed the tone and temper of American political life. If he becomes the Republican nominee, he will demolish its structural underpinnings as well. Should he prevail in November, his election will alter its very fabric in ways likely to prove irreversible. Whether Trump ever delivers on his promise to “Make America Great Again,” he is already transforming American democratic practice. Trump takes obvious delight […]
In Donald Trump Nobody Can Hear You Screaming
EDITOR’S NOTE: Click on volume icon, bottom right, for audio NPR: Christie’s secretly conceived decision last week to endorse Trump has provoked shock, anger and disappointment from all corners. After Christie refused to take questions about Trump at a news conference at the statehouse in Trenton on Monday, six New Jersey newspapers from the Gannett company penned a joint editorial saying Christie should be recalled for ignoring the people of the state. And a poll released Wednesday showed that his job approval in the state stood at 27 percent, an all-time low, following the endorsement. One of his critics’ chief […]
THE UNITARIAN: A Q&A With Senator Cory Booker
Artwork by DonkeyHotey BY CHARLIE TAYLOR This past week, Phawker was privileged to speak to Senator Cory Booker, the junior United States Senator (Dem.) from New Jersey and former Mayor of Newark. A former Rhodes scholar and graduate of Yale Law School, Senator Booker is a young, telegenic and charismatic politician, known for his dedication to community service and mastery of social media. He will be at the Philadelphia Free Library tonight (Tuesday March 1st) discussing his new book, United: Thoughts on Finding Common Ground and Advancing the Common Good, in which he describes his history, both personal and political, […]
INCOMING: Return Of The Flight of the Conchords
SUB POP: Grammy Award-winning folk comedy duo Flight of the Conchords (aka Jemaine Clement and Bret McKenzie) will return to the U.S. this summer. The “Flight of the Conchords sing Flight of the Conchords Tour”, is their first since co-headlining 2014’s “Oddball Comedy & Curiosity Tour”. Jemaine and Bret have new material in the works, which they’ll showcase exclusively at these shows. Bret had this to say of the upcoming tour: “I’m thrilled to get back on the road with over half the original band.” The amphitheatre and concert hall tour will make a stop in Philadelphia at the […]
LAST WEEK TONIGHT: #MakeDonaldDrumpfAgain
Oliver claims to understand why Trump’s supporters like him, as Trump is unpredictable and entertaining and could be seen as a “protest candidate.” For Oliver, though, “Donald Trump can seem appealing until you take a closer look, much like a lunch buffet at a strip club — or the NFL.” Oliver is in a unique position to critique Trump as the current Republican front runner tweeted that he had turned down an invitation to appear on the “very boring and low rated” show, Last Week Tonight, because it was a “waste of time and energy.” However, according to Oliver, no […]
BEING THERE: Julia Holter @ Johnny Brenda’s
Photo by Mary Lynn Dominguez Early Friday morning, I took the blow of a complicated, dramatic break-up. It was another one of those “It’s not you, it’s me,” “No, wait, it’s you, you are afraid of being alone,” “It’s just bad timing,” “I need space”— You know, a gross concoction of blame and excuses to address that it’s just not working out. Later that afternoon, half in preparation for the show and half as a remedy for being dumped, I put on Julia Holter’s 2015 full-length Have You In My Wilderness and took a walk around my neighborhood. Temperatures were […]
ZERO DARK THIRTY: A Q&A With Investigative Journalist & New Yorker Staff Writer Jane Mayer
BY JONATHAN VALANIA William S. Burroughs famously said “A paranoid is someone who knows a little of what’s going on.” Cold comfort for the likes of Hillary Clinton who was widely derided back in 1998 for claiming there was “a vast right wing conspiracy” leveraging its colossal wealth and powers of persuasion to bring down the Clintons and the liberal progressive agenda they had come to represent (if not quite embody). Dark Money, the latest must-read by acclaimed investigative journalist and New Yorker staff writer Jane Mayer, reveals overwhelming and incontrovertible evidence that Clinton was in fact right. And then some. […]
CONTEST: Win Tix To See Ty Segall @ The Troc
Ty Segall is a bad moon rising. Ty Segall smells like victory. Ty Segall is what happens when good people do bad angel dust. Ty Segall is the sound of one hand crapping. Ty Segall is what happened to the dude that sold you shitty brown weed in the boy’s room of the seventh grade of your mind. Ty Segall is what happens when you give Sam Kinison a tab of purple sunshine and a copy of The Slider instead of a bag of coke and Appetite For Destruction. Ty Segall is what would have happened if the Butthole […]
Q&A: Jacob Bond, Star Of #boyband Mockumentary
BY CHARLIE TAYLOR boyband is a hilarious new mockumentary web series that, as the title suggests, lampoons the boy band phenomenon. In a verite style reminiscent of The Office or This Is Spinal Tap, boyband gives the viewer a behind the scenes glimpse of the making of a pre-fab pop stars, as five wouldbe teen idols are fed into the machinery of the pop industrial complex and emerge as the hapless competition of the likes of One Direction — or, as the show’s tagline puts it, “five doofuses make the transition from garage band to boy band.” Hilarity ensues. […]