The fact is that there’s not much consistently intelligent political comment in popular music, and I do like much of what I hear in her work. She remembers things that others forget, even though those things are very important. She reads her own poetry, which contain significant perceptions and well-known politically progressive ideas, and she also reads the poetry of Judy Grahn.
3 New Orleans Musicians: Fats Domino, Louis Armstrong, and Aaron Neville
Fats Domino is a man who wants to be the only lover of a particular young woman in “All By Myself,” an attitude that seems friendly and self-possessed, without torment, without undue force (I imagine a contemporary version would be…
Whimsy, Sweetness, & Tears: The Music of Corinne Bailey Rae
Corinne Bailey Rae’s songs have an infectious romanticism. One recognizes the romanticism—the dreamy lack of realism—and still feels seduced by Rae’s hopeful emotions and evocative situations.
The Thrills Are Here: B.B. King’s The Ultimate Collection
B.B. King, born September 16, 1925, in the Mississippi Delta, is the king of the blues. His anthology The Ultimate Collection is as good an introduction to the blues as any: and what is notable is the fact that it gives pleasure.
Boyish Intensities: Dashboard Confessional’s Dusk and Summer
There’s a calculated roughness to “Rooftops and Invitations.” It’s interesting that the first songs on the album are fast and loud, and the later songs begin to be slower, more quiet, as if a point was being made with the first songs (the point?—the proof of masculinity).
Elegant Rock (Or, Impressing Posterity): The Best of Morrissey and Ringleader of the Tormentors
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Steven Patrick Morrissey is now middle-age. In a culture that does not worship youth so much as pander to it—with all the contempt and desperation and envy that suggests—it is interesting to observe people who are aging well: still feeling, still thinking, still creating, still growing.
A review of February Flowers by Fan Wu
The moment of transformation comes late in the novel, and is handled so subtly that it is easy to miss. Nevertheless the reader is left with a satisfying conclusion that doesn’t limit the story with overt sensationalism. February Flowers is a beautifully…
A review of Escaping Reality by Geoff Nelder
Well written, clever and full of black wit Escaping Reality is a hard to put down, stylish romp. There are laugh outloud moments, in prison, on the run, and back in prison again, plenty of twists, a compelling cast, an evocative setting,…
Melancholy Meditation: Frank Sinatra’s In the Wee Small Hours
“I Get Along Without You Very Well” is a song I’m more used to hearing women sing, and it’s interesting to hear Sinatra claim the love and vulnerability in the song. His phrasing is conversational but his tone is musical (he never just sounds as if he’s speaking the lyrics, as some singers do).
Meryl Streep in The Devil Wears Prada
What The Devil Wears Prada does is suggest something of that dilemma, but it pays such respect to Miranda Priestly that the alternatives that do exist do not appear with the appropriate appeal or drama in the world the film gives us: alternative ways of being, feeling, thinking, and valuing are barely seen.