Photo by EVAN HUNDELT On top of being a master of moustache, musical composition, and satire, Frank Zappa is undisputedly one of the greatest guitarists of all time. He released 62 albums over the course of his career, and 50 more have been posthumously released by the Zappa Family Trust. Somehow, out of the 112 albums, no two are alike – his spectrum of styles encompasses amorphous improvisational shredding, free jazz, comedy rock, prog rock, orchestrated toy-like noise, and an array of uncategorizable whackery. Since the passing of Frank’s widow, Gail Zappa, their eldest son, Ahmet, has been the controversial […]
GEEK SQUAD: 5 Reasons Why Endgame Is Badass
BY RICHARD SUPLEE GEEK SPACE CORRESPONDENT No one was shocked when Avengers: Endgame crushed the box office opening weekend. Both nerds and normies alike — legions of them — waited for this film since last year’s bummer-ific Avengers: Infinity War. Hell, this film has been hyped for years. The entire Marvel Cinematic Universe built to this moment. And the film lived up to that hype–I cheered, laughed, cried, and said “Holy fuck!” to myself at least 20 times while watching it. WARNING: The preceding is the end of the spoiler-free segment of this article. If you have not yet […]
CINEMA: A Friend Of The Devil Is A Friend Of Mine
HAIL SATAN? (Directed by Penny Lane, 95 minutes, USA, 2019) BY DAN TABOR FILM CRITIC Given the FUBAR state of our country, it’s no surprise that we are inundated with documentaries that try to soothe our troubled minds with Netflix-ian Schadenfreude. Whether it be true crime truth-squadding, pedophile gotchas or rich millennial douchebags stranded on a desert island, our United States Of Fear are perpetuated by these granular takes on real-life human suffering. All of which was on my mind when, with some reluctance, I sat down to watch Hail Satan?, the disarmingly feel-good documentary about the Satanic Temple […]
WORTH REPEATING: America’s Drug Problem
PHILADELPHIA MAGAZINE: I was at the end of the long table in the conference room when I realized the drugs had become a problem. As I tried to focus on the presentation — some suit droning on about tax benefits and pricing tiers — I zoned out, and my face became flushed. Burning-hot rage pulsed across my skin, crackled down to my fingertips, then shot back. I wasn’t sure I could make it out of the room without doing something I’d regret. I’d always known that it could come to this — that the compounds I’d been injecting all […]
The Second Coming Of The Nat Turner Rebellion
BY SEAN HECK The Nat Turner Rebellion was a circa late ‘60s/early ‘70s Philadelphia funk-soul quartet who took their name from the infamous slave uprising led by the titular Nat Turner in 1831. Which was a very bold move in a time of pronounced racial strife for a band that trafficked in Black Power themes in addition to the de rigueur hippie musings and love song tropes that were typical of their late ‘60s soul contemporaries. The Nat Turner Rebellion’s debut LP was cut at the legendary Sigma Sound Studios and set for release in 1972 on the Philly […]
NPR 4 THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When U Can’t
FRESH AIR: In 2015, a woman named Dee Dee Blanchard was found stabbed to death in the Missouri home she shared with her teenage daughter, Gypsy Rose. As the details surrounding the murder came out, it was revealed that Blanchard had falsely convinced Gypsy Rose and everyone they knew — including doctors — that Gypsy Rose was seriously ill and needed to use a wheelchair. After her death, Blanchard was posthumously diagnosed with Munchausen syndrome by proxy, a mental health disorder in which a person makes up or causes illness in a person under their care. Actor Patricia Arquette, […]
Win Tix To See Patti Smith @ The Met Philly
From the Phawker archives, we present this ode to the high priestess of punk written by Amy Z. Quinn, circa 2007, to mark Patti Smith’s induction into the Rock N’ Roll Hall Of Fame: “She’s hardly the most famous performer to ever come out of Jersey — The Boss and The Chairman Of The Board still hold those titles — but without a doubt, Patti Smith, the High Poetess of Punk, remains the greatest communicator of the kind of nameless electric angst that drives Kids In Search Of Something to head north on the Jersey Turnpike and never look […]
SATANIC PANIC: Q&A With Director Penny Lane
BY DAN TABOR FILM CRITIC Recently Phawker had the opportunity to chat with documentarian Penny Lane, whose strangely feel good portrait of The Satanic Temple, Hail Satan? opens in Philadelphia this week. Lane got her big break with her oddly humane and hilarious political portrait Our Nixon, which was comprised of Super 8 home movies confiscated by the FBI during the Watergate investigation. It’s this intimate portrait of Richard Nixon that really set the bar for the Lane’s cinematic style going forward. After Nixon, she tackled John Romulus Brinkley, a doctor who attempted to cure impotence via goat testicle […]
BEING THERE: Sunn O))) @ Underground Arts
Photo by ERIC ASHLEIGH The dark lords of the drone metal Sith, Sunn O))) consists of guitarists Stephen O’Malley and Greg Anderson, a pair of spooky black druid robes, and lots and lots of smoke. Trafficking in tectonically slow strumming and seismic sludge tones, Sunn O))) create one of the most unique musical spectacles of our time. They’ve collaborated with other spectacles over the years, such as Boris, Ulver, Nurse With Wound, and even Mayhem’s Atilla, and have just released their latest album, Life Metal, for Record Store Day, recorded by legendary recording engineer Steve Albini. Their next album, Pyroclasts, […]
CINEMA: This Is The End
AVENGERS: ENDGAME (Directed by Joe & Anthony Russo, 181 min., USA, 2019) BY DAN TABOR FILM CRITIC The end is near. It’s taken 22 films and 10 years of story to get to this moment: the titular endgame of the MCU’s Infinity Saga. Having lost to Thanos (Josh Brolin), their greatest foe, who brought “balance” the universe by killing half its population — including half The Avengers — in an instant with the cosmically powered Infinity Gauntlet in last year’s Infinity War, the surviving Avengers attempt to cope with the aftermath and undo the damage done. Given the myriad narrative […]
TAME IMPALA: Elephant
They play The Mann on August 23rd. Tickets go on sale Friday at 10 AM HERE.
BEING THERE: Nick Mason’s Saucerful Of Secrets @ The Met
Photos by JOSH PELTA-HELLER Sooner or later all British men turn into Michael Caine and Pink Floyd drummer Nick Mason is a very British man. But, judging by his masterful helmsmanship of Saucerful Of Secrets at The Met Philly Saturday night, the 75-year-old Mason’s chops remain undiminished by the passage of a half century-plus since Floyd’s inception. Nick Mason’s Saucerful Of Secrets is, for those not in the know, the titular drummer from Pink Floyd joined by some Floyd org alums, plus the guitarist from Spandau Ballet (don’t ask), performing songs from The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn — […]
I Went To A Star Wars Convention With My 10 Year Old Daughter & All We Got Was A Hella Good Time
BY JON SOLOMON & MAGGIE SOLOMON-SCHELLER Rushing straight from the airport into McCormick Place with my 10 year-old daughter for our weekend in Chicago at Star Wars Celebration, it was hard not to channel True Hero of the Rebellion Wedge Antilles in the cockpit of his X-Wing, gazing upon the Death Star for the first time:?? “Look at the size of that thing.” Tens of thousands of Star Wars fans from all over the planet gathered at the nation’s largest convention center from April 11th through the 15th for the 20th annual edition of this enormous event, a potentially […]