BY COLE NOWLIN Let me start by saying I am a huge Breaking Bad fan. Best show ever, bar none. You should say a quick prayer to the Supreme Cosmic Deity of your choosing that you did not see me in September of 2013, because I would have ruined your day, all I talked about was that friggin’ show. I would talk to people about it with the zeal of a Mormon missionary trying to convert the uninitiated, bother my friends if they didn’t watch it, break your goddamn windows if you said an unkind word about the show […]
NPR 4 THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When U Can’t
FRESH AIR In the existential comedy Birdman, Michael Keaton plays Riggan Thomson, a washed up, insecure actor looking for a second shot at fame and success. He’s entirely focused on himself. Keaton says this sort of narcissism — “that constant neediness and insecurity and whininess and me, me, me” — didn’t come easily to him. “When you’re one of originally nine children, there’s not a ton of room for that,” Keaton tells Fresh Air’s Terry Gross. “I was raised Catholic, so speaking about yourself or talking about yourself too much [wasn’t done]. And then, on the Protestant side of […]
THIS JUST IN: War On Drugs @ The Tower 3/27
Tickets go on sale at noon HERE
NPR 4 THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When You Can’t
Artwork by MARCO KLEFISCH THIS AMERICAN LIFE: Ira talks about the fact that he never much liked William Burroughs or his writing, just never got why Burroughs was this revered figure for some people. Then Ira heard a recent BBC documentary about Burroughs and finally understood. Ira says he’s going to play the whole documentary on the show in honor of what would have been Burroughs 101st birthday this week. Iggy Pop, the documentary’s narrator, begins by listing some of the artists and artistic movements influenced by Burroughs: Bob Dylan, The Beatles, Steely Dan, Kurt Cobain, Lou Reed; punk, heavy […]
BEING THERE: Jason Isbell @ The Keswick
Photo by RORY MCGLASSON Last night, Jason Isbell and his band The 400 Unit were a long way from the torrid climes of their home base of Muscle Shoals — about 50 degrees and a thousand miles, to be exact — inside the Keswick they made themselves right at home and turned up the heat but quick. Most of the sold-out crowd arrived early, and were rewarded for doing so by opening act, Damien Jurado. The Seattle-based indie singer-songwriter warmed the crowd with a tight acoustic set of intense and beautiful songs from his rich catalog. Isbell opened the night […]
ST. LENOX: I Still Dream Of The ’90s
"That Old Time Religion" Maxi-Single by St. Lenox “Your music really moves me, and I want to thank you for it.” — John Darnielle, The Mountain Goats DUSTED: The foremost thing here is the voice. It’s fluent, yanking melodies out of lines overstuffed with words. In the songs of St. Lenox, one would assume the prose came first, before the meter, but the voice finds a rhythm and it doesn’t always fall where it’s expected. It’s both clear and buzzy, not quite androngynous like the croon of Jimmy Scott, but residing in the same uncanny cabaret. How did Andy Choi […]
ODE TO BILLY JOEL: NY Mag Ranks The Piano Man
NEW YORK MAGAZINE: By the measure of hit-making, his stats are staggering. The New Yorker’s profile of him last year pointed out that he’s had 33 songs in the Top 40. That’s about a quarter of the songs he’s written and recorded. Most of those charted in the era when you had to sell a lot of records to get there, too. For critics, he’s a problem. They used to beat him up for his perceived lack of edge. Robert Christgau called his 1976 album Turnstiles “obnoxious,” which it is not. Lately, though — like every artist from a […]
THE RAILS: Habit
U.K. folk-rock duo comprised of Pernice Brothers/Pretenders/Ray Davies/Pogues side man James Walbourne and his wife Kami Thompson (daughter of Richard & Linda). This is quite lovely, like if the Everly Brothers had a sister and Lee Hazelwood was their dad. If only. They play upstairs as World Cafe Live tonight.
Deadly Plane Crashed Captured On Holy Shit! Cam
REUTERS: At least nine people were killed and dozens were unaccounted for after a Taiwanese TransAsia Airways plane with 58 passengers and crew on board crashed into a Taipei river shortly after take-off on Wednesday, officials and domestic media said. Dramatic pictures taken by a motorist and posted on Twitter showed the plane cartwheeling over a motorway close to Taipei’s downtown airport soon after the turboprop ATR 72-600 aircraft took off for the island of Kinmen. MORE
Win Tix To See Jason Isbell @ The Keswick Theater
We are very honored and excited to announce that we have a pair of tickets to give away to some lucky Phawker reader to see Jason Isbell at the Keswick Theater on Thursday February 5th! What’s that you say? ‘Who is Jason Tinkerbell?’ We’re gonna forget you said that and meet you on the other side of this New York Times profile from 2013: He found fame early and wasn’t ready for it. When he was 22, he joined the Drive-By Truckers, the brilliant and hard-living Alabama band. He quickly wrote several of the group’s signature songs, including the […]
UNFORGIVEN: Chris Kyle’s American Horror Story
BRADLEY COOPER ON FRESH AIR TODAY: “The fact that [the fact that American Sniper is] inciting a discussion that has nothing to do with vets — and it’s more about the Iraq war and what we did not do to indict those who decide to go to the war — every conversation in those terms is moving farther and farther away from what our soldiers go through, and the fact that 22 vets commit suicide each day,” Cooper says. “The amount of people that come home is so much greater because of medical advancement and … we need […]
COMMENTARY: Class War Is Over If You Want It
BY WILLIAM C. HENRY “If there’s a way for the super-rich to screw the middle and lower classes, they will find it.” So sayeth Uncle Bill Henry. Yes, but WHY do they do it, Uncle Bill? Well, according to this no doubt intellectually overrated but nonetheless venerated old fart, they do it because they can, and perhaps to a greater extent, because they can’t help it. You see, it’s extremely difficult — if not downright impossible — to have amassed extraordinary wealth in these or any other times without having inherited the sociopathy and cupidity genes (or, of course, without […]