Photo by SANDRO via NEW YORK MAGAZINE THE GUARDIAN: David Lynch works from a studio on a slope above one of three adjacent homes he owns in the Hollywood Hills, just a stone’s throw from Mulholland Drive. He is reclusive and seldom leaves this little realm, let alone grants audiences to journalists – but he is prepared to now, on the eve of publishing an unconventional memoir-cum-biography, Room To Dream. An assistant escorts me through the house (sleek concrete walls and surfaces, floor-to-ceiling shelves of VHS cassettes and CDs) and up through the garden to the studio. A snake slithered […]
SH*T MY UNCLE SAYS: Suffer The Children
Picture the Fox News anchor belching out the following lead: “A phony, insincere Chelsea Clinton (or Michelle Obama — take your pick) has visited our southern border to make it appear that she supports keeping illegal immigrant families together while showing her TRUE feelings by brandishing a coat with the following message emblazoned on its back, ‘I Really Don’t Care, Do U?’” Yeah, okay, so maybe I’ve cleaned it up a little. What else could I do? It was a FOX NEWS lead after all! So, why’d she do it? Well, all I can tell you is that literally […]
CONTEST: Win Tix To See Dr. Dog @ Festival Pier!
There are few greater pleasures in this American life than watching a relatively young, gifted rock band in the prime of its youth burn through its set before an adoring hometown crowd with the confidence of five young men who’ve come to realize that — after all the blood, the sweat and the tears that got them to this point — they are making their mark on the world. It’s even better when the young, gifted band is local, as will be the case when Dr. Dog takes the stage at the Festival Pier tomorrow night in support of […]
CINEMA: Dinosaur Jr.
JURASSIC WORLD: Fallen Kingdom (Dir. by J.A. Bayona, 128 min., USA, 2018) BY DAN TABOR FILM CRITIC Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard return for what is now the second entry in the reboot/retcon of the Jurassic Park series Jurassic Park: Fallen Kingdom. Picking up three years after the fateful events on Isla Nublar, the film begins as the volcano on the island that once housed the dino theme park is about to erupt annihilating all life on the island. On the world stage, the US Senate is deliberating on whether or not they will intervene to save the island’s […]
ALBUM REVIEW: God’s Favorite Customer
With God’s Favorite Customer, Joshua Tillman, the man behind Father John Misty, continues to solidify his reputation as a narcissistic grifter, though this time in the absence of his wife Emma. Written during a six-week hotel stay while the two were separated, God’s Favorite Customer is Tillman’s retreat into himself. It’s the emotional breakdown he has after, in the words of Joan Didion, he runs away to find himself and finds no one at home. If we go by Tillman’s own definition of authenticity as “empathizing with people and making them feel like what you’re talking about is somehow […]
FOR THOSE ABOUT TO ROCK: We Salute You!
This speaks for itself.
REVIEW: Kamasi Washington Heaven And Earth
Born to musical parents, and an alumnus of UCLA’s Department of Ethnomusicology, Kamasi Washington is a saxophonist, composer, producer, bandleader, and wizard. His latest album, Heaven And Earth, is a double-LP, which follows up from his first record on Young Turks in 2017, Harmony Of Difference. It’s his first full-length since releasing The Epic in 2015 on Flying Lotus’ Brainfeeder record label. Back in April of this year, Kamasi Washington explained the concept behind Heaven And Earth, tweeting, “The Earth side represents the world as I see it outwardly, the world that I am a part of. The Heaven […]
ALBUM REVIEW: Snail Mail Lush
Snail Mail, the solo project of Baltimore native Lyndsey Jordan, dropped their long-anticipated full length album, Lush, just last week. The baby-faced blonde juts out a defiant chin, her gaze steady and unflinching as she ruminates on unrequited love. The songwriting of Lush is blunt and pragmatic. She is both vulnerable and resilient, which makes listening to this record feels like reading your kid sister’s diary. What sets this album apart is the departure from the grainy scratch of lo-fi recordings as Snail Mail graduates from the invisibility of DIY culture. Boxed up compactly in 10 songs, the studio-produced […]
BEING THERE: The World Is A Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid To Die + Pianos Become Teeth @ UT
Photo by SOPHIE BURKHOLDER There’s almost nothing so darkly cathartic as an emo concert. Though many bands of the genre have drawn criticism for their controversial and cliched lyrics, those at the forefront are more serious and skilled than ever. Two such bands are Pianos Become the Teeth and Philadelphia-based The World Is a Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid to Die (TWIABP), who last night performed their final show of a joint tour in support of their new albums, Wait for Love and Always Foreign, respectively. The bloated lineup also featured emo-punks Teenage Wrist and soft rockers […]
BEACH HOUSE: Black Car
Beach House @ the Tower Theater on July 26th in support of their just-released seventh album, 7.
BEING THERE: Hockey Dad @ Everybody Hits
Photo by DYLAN LONG Australian rock bands are killing it right now. The Australian rock scene is chock full of bands that are sick as hell and on the come-up, and I will not hold back my enthusiasm. Eclectic jangle rockers Dune Rats just wrapped up touring as main support for the well-established surf-rock group Wavves in the UK. The joyful garage rock trio Skegss are riding a gnarly wave of sold-out shows in pretty much all major cities across Straya, with solid support from local bands Dumb Punts & Los Scallywags . Which leads us to one of the […]
ALBUM REVIEW: Neko Case Hell-On
Neko Case is a singer-songwriter known for her uncommonly clarion vox, acerbic whimsy, nature mothering, and fiery red hair. But after the public exorcism of the #MeToo movement and the burning down of her Vermont home, the soft rock singer was forced to confront a new set of ugly and harsh realities. And she uses her new album, Hell-On, to help her do it. There is some serious introspection on the record, with the the lead-off title track diving right in to question who or what God is, finally defining him as “a lusty tire fire” – a line […]
BEING THERE: U2 @ The Wells Fargo Center
Photo by JOSH PELTA-HELLER Entering the U2 Experience at the FU Center last night (yeah yeah, I know, but c’mon – it will ALWAYS be the FU Center), I did little in the way of recon. I have not heard these so called Songs Of Experience nor those of Innocence. I don’t know if the Line On The Horizon even had a lead-off single, and heaven knows, my ex can tell you with all honesty that I have no idea How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb. In other words, I haven’t listened to the entirety of an actual U2 album […]