WARNING: Possibly NSFW
RIP: J.D. Salinger, ‘Hermit Crab Of American Letters’
TIME: Take the austere little paperbacks down from the shelf and you can hold the collected works of J.D. Salinger — one novel, three volumes of stories — in the palm of one hand. Like some of his favorite writers — like Sappho, whom we know only from ancient fragments, or the Japanese poets who crafted 17-syllable haikus — Salinger was an author whose large reputation pivots on very little. The first of his published stories that he thought were good enough to preserve between covers appeared in the New Yorker in 1948. Sixteen years later he placed one last […]
PAPERBOY: Slow-Jamming The Alt-Weeklies
BY DAVE ALLEN Like time, news waits for no man. Keeping up with the funny papers has always been an all-day job, even in the pre-Internets era. These days, however, it’s a two-man job. That’s right, these days you need someone to do your reading for you, or risk falling hopelessly behind and, as a result, increasing your chances of dying lonely and somewhat bitter. That’s why every week PAPERBOY does your alt-weekly reading for you. We pore over those time-consuming cover stories and give you the takeaway, suss out the cover art, warn you off the ink-wasters and steer […]
RIP: Howard Zinn, Man Who Challenged The Rule That ‘History Is The Consensus Of The Empowered’
HOWARD ZINN: “Once we decided, at the start, that our side was the good side and the other side was evil …… we did not have to think any more. Then we could commit unspeakable acts and it was all right.” NEW YORK TIMES: Howard Zinn, an author, teacher and political activist whose leftist ”A People’s History of the United States” became a million-selling alternative to mainstream texts and a favorite of such celebrities as Bruce Springsteen and Ben Affleck, died Wednesday. He was 87. Published in 1980 with little promotion and a first printing of 5,000, ”A People’s History” […]
SIDEWALKING: Diary Of A Madman
Ozzy, Borders, Market & Chestnut, 6 PM by JEFF FUSCO TARA MURTHA: Thick as a bible, I Am Ozzy is a lightning-read account of one man’s journey into and out of the sludgy bowels of the rock and roll beast. Pensive now at 61, I Am Ozzy is a (mostly) sober account of a very drunk and deluded time fueled by the time-honored collision course of inflatable egos and endless cocaine (back in the day, Black Sabbath didn’t even know who was paying for or sending the unmarked vans stacked with tidy boxes of wax-capped vials of medical grade powder). […]
WORTH REPEATING: Geator Still Packing Heater
PHILADELPHIA WEEKLY: The sound is vintage, from when radio was king in Philadelphia. Jocko Henderson, Hy Lit, Georgie Woods, the recently passed George Michael—these DJs were local superstars on stations that defined neighborhoods—WIBBAGE, WDAS, WHAT—with call-letter allegiance determined by race, parish and hip factor. And Blavat ended up the biggest of them all, if not by celebrity, then at least by staying power. “As commercial radio continues to blow, legendary DJs are dying,” says WXPN’s Bruce Warren, who puts the Geator on the air every Saturday night. “There was something about growing up in Philly listening to these guys. There […]
ALBUM REVIEW: Blood Feathers Goodness Gracious
BLOOD FEATHERS Goodness Gracious (Philebrity) Philly-based six-piece the Blood Feathers — featuring the dual lead vocal dream-team of Ben Dickey and Drew Mills — strikes again and more often than not catches the proverbial lightning in a bottle. A bottle of moonshine, to be exact. Released earlier this month, the Philebrity label rockers’ second full length, Goodness Gracious, is a mid winter pick-me-up that arrives not a moment too soon. Kicking things off with a fuzzy throwback to the Exiles-era Stones, Dickey and Mills belt out catchy harmonies atop buzzing guitars that nicely showcases the band’s classic-rock chops and considerable […]
SCRAPPLE TV NEWS: The Week That Was
With your host, A.P. Ticker.
BUMMER: Los Angeles City Council Votes To Shut Down Most Medical Marijuana Dispensaries
ASSOCIATED PRESS: The Los Angeles City Council on Tuesday tentatively approved an ordinance to close most of the city’s medical marijuana dispensaries, winding down months of debate on how to limit the rapid spread of such clinics. The ordinance, if passed next week by a simple majority of the 15-member council, would cap the number of dispensaries at 70 and require them to be at least 1,000 feet from “sensitive uses” — schools, parks and other public gathering spots. The local law would put an end to the proliferation of pot dispensaries. As many as 1,000 have cropped up over […]
ARTSY: Nun Shall Pass
[Artwork by RYE BREAD] Shark had it comin’.
THE WALL: Newsday.com Has 35 Paid Subscribers
NEW YORK OBSERVER: In late October, Newsday, the Long Island daily that the Dolans bought for $650 million, put its web site, newsday.com, behind a pay wall. The paper was one of the first non-business newspapers to take the plunge by putting up a pay wall, so in media circles it has been followed with interest. Could its fate be a sign of what others, including The New York Times, might expect? So, three months later, how many people have signed up to pay $5 a week, or $260 a year, to get unfettered access to newsday.com? The answer: 35 […]
BREAKING: ‘Pimp’ From ACORN Sting Videos Arrested By FBI For Wiretapping Senator’s Phone
[Illustration by ALEX FINE] ASSOCIATED PRESS: A conservative activist who posed as a pimp to target the community-organizing group ACORN and the son of a federal prosecutor were among four people arrested by the FBI and accused of trying to interfere with phones at Sen. Mary Landrieu’s office. Activist James O’Keefe, 25, was already in Landrieu’s New Orleans office Monday when Robert Flanagan and Joseph Basel, both 24, showed up claiming to be telephone repairmen, U.S. Attorney Jim Letten’s office said Tuesday. Letten says O’Keefe recorded the two with his cell phone. Flanagan, the son of acting U.S. Attorney Bill […]
Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About The New Drive-By Truckers Album But Were Afraid To Ask
The Drive-By Truckers announced the first part of The Big To-Do tour, screenings of their documentary, The Secret To A Happy Ending and offer free MP3. The Big To-Do is slated for release on March 16, 2010 on ATO Records. DBT and ATO Records are offering up the first single, “This Fucking Job”, from The Big To-Do for free [CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD]. The premiere screening of the DBT documentary, The Secret To A Happy Ending, is scheduled for February 5, 2010 at AFI Silver Theatre in Silver Spring, MD. This is a film about the redemptive power of rock-and-roll; […]