One of the things I admire about the jazz tradition is the fluidity with which musicians move from being leaders to sidemen. Take an album like Conference of Birds by…
When I started writing this series a number of years ago, I didn’t think I would be including Stephen J. Malkmus in the line up. My last year in college…
Yes, social media can be a waste of time, and a low self esteem machine. Yes, it facilitates hate and social sniping. But – with a good roster of musical…
I don’t make best-of lists at the end of the year, but the song I spent the most time listening to in 2019 was B-Movie by Gil Scott Heron: It’s…
My favorite track to come out over the past year or so is from the album Humble Pi, which is a collaboration between two great artists, Homeboy Sandman and Edan.…
Simon Joyner once said to me I wish I could sing like Tim Buckley, but I do what I can with what I have. I said I felt the same…
I rarely hear an entire record played on the radio. A few months ago, I heard the album Eskimo by the Residents played on WXDU’s stellar Sunday afternoon show, Polyphonic…
One possible answer to the question I posed in my post on Reckoning with REM – How come their early portraits of Southern life never said anything about the history…
We’re used to thinking of problems as a word that goes hand in hand with “personal.” Of course, there are problems in our professional lives. But when we struggle with…
Recently I’ve been working on two projects at the same time, Gnawing on the Bone and Soy Aqui. I usually don’t do this but have found that there is an…
Top 40 Over 40.16: Holding It Down
One possible answer to the question I posed in my post on Reckoning with REM – How come their early portraits of Southern life never said anything about the history…