It’s fashionable to decry the derivative nature of much current American entertainment; my son Colin’s favorite example would be Rambo: First Blood, Part II, which reads like a parody of the unimaginative nature of much contemporary American film. Then there are the American remakes of foreign originals: as a group, they’re taken to demonstrate how [...]
I must begin with a disclaimer: I’m not one of those creepy middle-aged guys who has some kind of weird “thing” for the Olsen twins—especially not in their 8-year-old incarnation. That’s not why we’re here today. And until a couple of days ago, I had no idea they’d enjoyed such a prolific musical career. Rather, [...]
As promised/threatened yesterday—and what a vibrant conversation yesterday, y’all!—I want to work through some impressions of The Devil and Daniel Johnston (2006), a pretty riveting documentary recommended to me by fcrp reader Steve. It turned out to be a great way to redeem a long stretch of otherwise exasperating insomnia last week. But you don’t [...]
So after the tough sledding of the past few days, it’s time for us all to frolic a bit in the shallow end of the cultural pool: it is, after all, still summer, and Labor Day’s just around the corner. Here, then, a parlor game: What are your ten favorite “rock movies”? That phrase wobbles [...]
Well, this is an interesting problem to have: the comments on yesterday’s post, from Ken, Scott, Susie, Tim—they’re just wonderful. Between them, amongst them, they’ve effectively stolen my “thunder”—and seem, without having seen it, to be running through Steve’s outline on the topic, as well. I’d thought it would take a couple more posts to [...]
[Part 4 of 4] But what price popularity? Though it’s hard to find a truly critical word written about Supernatural, given the excitement of Santana’s long-time fans at his return to the spotlight, in fact it’s a rather uneven record. The collaborative tracks on Supernatural and the 2002 follow-up album Shaman (featuring appearances by Musiq, [...]
Back in the 60s, in an attempt to attract a new generation of the faithful back into the fold, American Catholics pioneered “folk worship” services: Sunday mass in which an acoustic guitar led young congregants in praise and worship songs. It represented a brush with ecumenicism, as well as a flirtation with popular youth culture: [...]
So as promised/threatened yesterday, three songs that operate roughly along the lines of the songs suggested by [correction!] faithful fcrp reader Steve: Songs that seem to be moving in one direction, carrying us merrily along, only to dart suddenly in another direction. Or in which a single word or phrase has an undue amount of [...]
Somebody—U. Kentucky musicologist Kevin Holm-Hudson, I believe—posted a link on Facebook yesterday to a story in The Onion, with this intro: “Yet another strange musical twist in Dylan’s long storied career. Wonder what Greil Marcus would say about this? .” Hours and hours later, there are still no comments to Kevin’s post, and I think [...]
Changes in the format and delivery of music—in both technology and packaging—would seem to have spelled the death of context for contemporary popular music, liner notes being only one element of that context. Our music has become much more a part of our multitasking lifestyle, only rarely indulged in as the sole focus of our [...]