Peter Gabriel & Me: The Power of Music (Revisited)
Sean MurphyThe face this guy makes when he listens to "Here Comes the Flood" by Peter Gabriel. Maybe not every time, and certainly not every time he is driving. But it's…
Brooklyn Reading #9: Good Neighbors/Newark Airport, 1980
May 29, 2014. It was billed as a throwback to the old Beatnik days, minus the bongos and clove cigarettes. As such, New York City was a mandatory locale; Brooklyn…
Sorry, Charlie: On Art and Extremism (Revisited)
OF COURSE RELIGION IS the problem. For anyone who, understandably, would say it’s a political issue and not a religious issue, I aver that so many of our political difficulties…
Led Zeppelin on Led Zeppelin (Revisited)
We tend to not think of Led Zeppelin as actual human beings. The reason, of course, is that they are not. At least not in the ways that can be…
Victory and Sorrow: Bright Moments from Three Masters (Revisited)
HOW TO TALK ABOUT JAZZ MUSIC? Well, perhaps it’s better to determine how not to talk about jazz music. Hearing is believing. That’s all there is to it. And if…
O’Connor and Coltrane: Saints of American Art
i. I never, until this year, made the explicit connection between John Coltrane and Flannery O’Connor. Why should I have? One was an introverted white woman, a southern writer who…
Stop Me If You’ve Heard This One Before* (Revisited)
Let me tell you a story. It involves a white male born in a steadily prospering town to a slowly prospering family. His father, the first in his Irish family…
Emotional feedback on a timeless wavelength: Rush’s ‘Permanent Waves’ (Revisited)
How unbelievably appropriate that Permanent Waves was released on January 1, 1980? In virtually every regard, this album ended the '70s (literally) and foreshadowed the fertile grounds (reggae, pop elements,…
My Annual New Year’s Eve Message
As always, it’s a hell of a lot easier to keep these things in perspective by considering the (increasing) number of our brothers and sisters who are struggling just to…
Dave Henderson: RIP
This hurts. Saw the immortal ALCS game in real time. Pops, a long-suffering Boston-born Sox fan, had seen this movie before (and would see it again in a fashion even…