Laura Poitras, 2015 Investigative Reporters & Editors Conference, Marriott, 10:54 AM by JONATHAN VALANIA PHAWKER: What do you make of the so-called NSA reform legislation currently making the rounds of Congress? LAURA POITRAS: It’s good that we are actually having this debate. Obviously, in a democracy we shouldn’t have secret laws and secret interpretations of laws that violate the Constitution, but [the reform legislation currently before Congress] doesn’t go far enough. PHAWKER: What do you say to people who insist that we would have been right where we are right now, having this debate about the overbroad powers of the […]
CINEMA: The Gym Class
RESULTS (2015, directed by Andrew Bujalski, 105 minutes, U.S.) BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC Without name actors and with just the slenderest threads of plot, writer/director Andrew Bujalski has made four of the most smart and perceptive American comedies of our era. While his last, the 80s period piece Computer Chess, was his most ambitious, his latest, a small scale romantic comedy called Results, brings name actors into the mix for the first time. Just having Guy Pearce (unashamedly sporting an Australian accent) and Cobie Smulders from How I Met Your Mother starring in the film makes Results Bujalski’s most […]
BEING THERE: Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds @ The Merriam
Photo by RORY MCGLASSON During the start of the sold-out Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds concert at the Merriam Theatre last night, a brazen (and presumably drunken) heckler asked Noel of the whereabouts of his younger brother, the ex-Oasis frontman. “Where’s Liam? the man screamed. With two hands on the left side of his chest, Gallagher said, “He’s probably sitting down somewhere at home doing absolutely fuck all.” The crowd — a mix of soccer-loving Manchester City-clad ex-pats, and diehard Noel devotees from Malaysia, Germany, and Jersey — cheered his response. These are Noel’s fans. They absolutely adore him, as […]
Q&A: Talking Love & Mercy With Brian Wilson
Photo by MARK HANAUER via Rock Paper Photo BY JONATHAN VALANIA Brian Wilson is not a big talker. Music, glorious music, is his gift, not gab. He partnered with a lyricist for his greatest works — Tony Asher on Pet Sounds, Van Dyke Parks on Smile and Mike Love on “Good Vibrations.” He’s not one of those artists who like to use the celebrity interview format to deliver expansive ruminations about the world according to Brian Wilson. In fact, having interviewed him several times over the years, it is patently obvious that he sees talking to the press as a […]
CHET DELCAMPO: Story
A summer-themed viddy for BRIAN WILSON WEEK donated by our pal Chet Delcampo.
NPR 4 THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When You Can’t
Photo by William Heinemann for Wired FRESH AIR There’s a side to the Internet most people have never visited. Tor Hidden Services, or the Tor Network, is an encrypted, hidden network of about 50,000 websites that can’t be accessed with a traditional browser like Chrome or Firefox. Its users include criminals, trolls and extremists. Author Jamie Bartlett (pictured, above), who chronicles the secret corners of the Internet in his book The Dark Net, likens it to the “wild West.” “You have anonymous users visiting sites that can’t be censored. So anybody with something to hide, whether it’s for good reasons […]
JIM BOGGIA & FRIENDS: Ode To Billy Joe
A remarkable side project analog to Tara Murtha’s recently-published 33 & 1/3 treatise on the still-unsolved southern gothic murder mystery at the center of Bobbie Gentry’s eerie, Rosebud-like 1967 AM radio hit and the concert — an impeccable track by track live recreation of the album, with uncanny fidelity to the original recording — that celebrated the book’s publication at Underground Arts back in December. We’re gonna go out on a limb here and say this is not just worthy of the original, it’s actually BETTER — thicker, rounder, grittier, more here and now. The video, which documents the live-in-the-studio […]
MIC DROP: Top 10 Things I Learned Seeing Brian Wilson At The Beacon Theater w/ Actor Paul Dano
EDITOR’S NOTE: This originally published on October 17th, 2013 1. Don’t tell anyone but I always cry at Brian Wilson concerts. His music — Pet Sounds in particular — is just so ineffably sad and beautiful. His life is so sad and tragic, albeit with a reasonably happy ending. I’ve seen him perform live nearly a dozen times. Whenever the opportunity arises I jump on it because every show could be his last. Or mine, for that matter. I always promise myself I’m not going to cry this time but I always do. Tuesday night at The Beacon Theater it […]
INCOMING: Hall & Oates To Christen The Fillmore
Hall & Oates — famed Philly blue-eyed soul stirrers turned MTV hit machine videodrones turned Where Are They Now? file habitues turned resurrected object of semi-ironic hipster fascination — will christen The Fillmore, Live Nation’s new mid-size/all-purpose Fishtown entertainment complex (it’s a music venue! it’s a comedy club! it’s a 24-lane bowling alley! it’s a distillery! it’s an Italian restaurant! it’s all those things as once!) on October 1st. You can check out a complete list of confirmed bookings HERE.
FLYING SAUCER ATTACK: Unstrumental No. 7
Flying Saucer Attack release Instrumentals 2015, their first album in 15 years on Friday the 17th of July 2015. Comprised of 15 fresh David Pearce solo performances recorded in characteristically lo-fi manner at home, using guitars only on tape and CD-R, Instrumentals 2015 is an album that will appeal both to FSA diehards and those wholly unfamiliar with the outfit’s recorded output. The 15 tracks on Instrumentals 2015 present an impressionistic narrative which transports the listener through the excoriating dronescapes and rueful introspection of the album’s early pieces to the more redemptive cadences of its closing half. Given its sense […]
COMMENT: Never Drop Your Gun To Hug A Grizzly
BY WILLIAM C. HENRY So there I was in the waiting room waiting to be called for my MRI and I happened to pick up a copy of American Rifleman to pass the time. I’d been thinking about purchasing a small handgun off and on for some time and thought I’d bone up on available options. Now, for me to be seen reading AR is a wee bit like Robert Reich getting caught with a copy of Barry Goldwater’s Conscience of a Conservative on his nightstand. Anyway, leafing through it I was mildly surprised to come across not just […]
THIS JUST IN: The NAACP Is Coming To Town
NAACP TO HOST 106TH ANNUAL NATIONAL CONVENTION IN PHILADELPHIA JULY 11th -15th Convention to Unite Thousands of Social Justice Activists Around Voting Rights, Criminal Justice Reform, Economic Opportunity, Health Equity and Education Equality (BALTIMORE, MD) – From July 11th to the 15th, the NAACP will host its 106th Annual Convention in Philadelphia, PA. This year’s convention theme is “Pursuing Liberty In the Face of Injustice.” In the wake of the social and economic unrest across the country, the NAACP will focus on building a broad based agenda around voting rights, criminal justice reform, health equity, economic opportunity and education equality […]
BEING THERE: Security Guard @ Roots Picnic 2015
[Via KODAKLENS] RELATED: Our Complete Coverage Of The Roots Picnic 2015