Jodie Janella Horn

About Jodie Janella Horn

Born and raised in the cultural wasteland of Santa Rosa, California in 1980, Jodie spent much of her early childhood competing in track and field until she could no longer tolerate scheduling conflicts between practice and Punky Brewster. In 2000 she received a B.A. in Anthropology and moved to Los Angeles, making guest appearances in London; Portland, Oregon; and Oakland, where she met her husband. A full-time writer, Jodie has completed an as of yet unpublished novel and contributes to PopMatters as a TV columnist, book reviewer, and the occasional feature.

Features

Ready for Primetime: An Interview With Go Set Go’s Mike TV

By Jodie Janella Horn

"The kind of people that seem to gravitate towards our music kind of get the humor and get the fact that, while it's humorous, it's also kind of deadly serious." [18 October 2006]

At the Intersection of Boob and Tube: The Bud-Sponsored Letdown of The Independent Television Festiv

By Jodie Janella Horn

Our fearless writer gets to the ever-retreating bottom of the Independent Television Festival and several free beers. [24 August 2006]

Live and Let Frey

By Jodie Janella Horn

Oprah compounded our schadenfreude by taking Frey onto her stage and essentially beating him with a yardstick while Frey's dunce cap bounced up and down to the rhythm of her vengeful strikes. [3 February 2006]

Kids Are Alright

By Jodie Janella Horn

At the Warped Tour, our would-be reporter confronts her fear of teenagers to indulge her fascination with their music. [29 July 2005]

You Oughta Know Better

By Jodie Janella Horn

Alanis Morissette's album of angry anthems for the Sassy generation has been re-released as an acoustic set sold exclusively by Starbucks. So much for feminism. [21 June 2005]

When I Came Around

By Jodie Janella Horn

It's been more than 10 years since Green Day had any cachet. So why are they the Beatles in 1963 as far as this author is concerned? Jodie Janella Horn confesses her humiliating yet ultimately liberating conversion to Green Day superfandom. [3 May 2005]

Rocking the Paisley Three-Piece Suit

By Jodie Janella Horn

OK Go discusses their new album, whirlyball, and gambling on fans' affection. [1 January 1995]

The Baseball Team Who Saved One Another: An Interview with John Albert

By Jodie Janella Horn

'There's nothing subversive about getting a Mohawk and walking around Silver Lake. When I was 16, if you got a tattoo, it was like, 'What the fuck are you doing?' There was nobody doing that. [Now] everyone is covered in tattoos. It means nothing. Dyeing your hair pink means nothing. Putting a metal post through your nose doesn't mean anything.' Jodie Janella Horn talks to John Albert about music, baseball, James Frey, and punk-rock death.

Salvation Artist

By Jodie Janella Horn

Dirty Found is on tour. Co-created by Jason Bitner, the magazine celebrates the smuttiest photos, notes, and other paraphernalia left laying about the world. Jodie Janella Horn caught up with Bitner in Los Angeles. 'I'm not an artist,' Bitner tells her. She begs to differ.

Columns

Dropping the Bombshell

By Jodie Janella Horn

Notes on the (hair) color code, from one of those (you know), blondes. [23 October 2006]

(more The Armchair Anthropologist)

Stars

By Jodie Janella Horn

If it's July, it's time for another installment of CBS's voyeuristic reality series. Unfortunately, while she loves the show, our arbiter of televised treats isn't thrilled with the 'all star' format. [10 July 2006]

(more The Armchair Anthropologist)

Cancelled Companions

By Jodie Janella Horn

Does it seem like every interesting, innovative series that you adore and worship gets yanked before its time? According to this rabid small screen fangirl, you are not alone. [7 June 2006]

(more The Armchair Anthropologist)

Three Ring Circus

By Jodie Janella Horn

While polygamy has a place in the study of human history and culture, it has long been considered taboo. Leave it to HBO and its new hit drama series to make this socially profane subject seem... almost normal. [8 May 2006]

(more The Armchair Anthropologist)

An Anthropologist on Mars

By Jodie Janella Horn

Want to learn more about the human race? Just turn on the TV and experience the foibles and frivolities of mankind as seen through the eyes of 'the others' -- filters in the form of aliens, robots, and talking animals. [30 January 2006]

(more The Armchair Anthropologist)

Norm!

By Jodie Janella Horn

While not necessarily looking for a place where everybody -- including the busboy -- knows your name, Horn would like to locate a new drinking establishment that offers a sitcom-style sense of community. [22 November 2005]

(more The Armchair Anthropologist)

Not the Cosbys

By Jodie Janella Horn

You know how they say everyone has a twin somewhere? Well, members of the Horn family look just like those people on (name that sitcom). [27 October 2005]

(more The Armchair Anthropologist)

Gatherers

By Jodie Janella Horn

Before Katrina, network news had spent a lot of time bemoaning the lack of viewers, to which I would like to respond; maybe you shouldn't have been so stupid. [19 September 2005]

(more The Armchair Anthropologist)

Coffee Stalk

By Jodie Janella Horn

In her celebrity filled Hollywood strip mall coffee store job, Horn is trying to figure out in what episode of Quantum Leap 'iced old-school Americano with two Splendas' guest starred. [18 August 2005]

(more The Armchair Anthropologist)

How to Find a Mate in Five TV Shows or Less

By Jodie Janella Horn

Scientists have spent a great deal of time deconstructing physical desirability among humans. But all they had to do was watch 100 Hottest Hotties and call it a day. [27 July 2005]

(more The Armchair Anthropologist)

There’s no ‘TV’ in ‘Team’

By Jodie Janella Horn

If the degree to which art imitates life can be a measure of greatness then The Office is king of the workplace comedy. [29 June 2005]

(more The Armchair Anthropologist)

High School of Hard Knocks

By Jodie Janella Horn

One of the benefits of no longer being a teenager is that I don't care if the high school dramas I watch are realistic because I no longer expect to be validated by television. [2 June 2005]

(more The Armchair Anthropologist)

Reviews

Empire of Dirt: The Aesthetics and Rituals of British Indie Music by Wendy Fonarow

By Jodie Janella Horn

When dissected, an indie rock gig isn't all that different from the stereotype of nearly naked dancers circling the fire as they fall into a trance. [20 June 2006]

Strapped: Why America’s 20- and 30-Somethings Can’t Get Ahead by Tamara Draut

By Jodie Janella Horn

I didn't need Tamara Draut to tell me that I'm strapped, but I did need her to tell my mom. [23 December 2005]

How I Paid for College: A Novel of Sex, Theft, Friendship & Musical Theater by Marc Acito

By Jodie Janella Horn

Edward is not a fish out of water or a struggling outsider concentrating on his differences, as it seems every adolescent in contemporary literature is. He feels very at home with his friends and has no shortage of self-esteem. [23 September 2005]

Sunset Junction Street Fair Featuring: Rilo Kiley + Eagles of Death Metal + The New York Dolls

By Jodie Janella Horn

The scene is like a mash-up of a 3D Urban Outfitters catalog with a revival of Hair... [9 September 2005]

How the Hula Girl Sings by Joe Meno

By Jodie Janella Horn

In the acknowledgements in Joe Meno's third novel, Hairstyles of the Damned, Meno writes, 'You Suck It: Judith Regan. Badly. And all you other bad publishing corporations. Be ready, the end is nigh.'" [1 September 2005]

Don’t Get Too Comfortable: The Indignities of Coach Class, the Torments of Low Thread Count, the Nev

By Jodie Janella Horn

He's a gay Jewish Canadian. Swoon! If only I could be one of those things, I would never get over my own fantastic exoticism. [30 August 2005]

A Movie… and a Book by Daniel Wagner

By Jodie Janella Horn

Essentially, A Movie... and a Book is a novel about writing a novel, which in terms of irritating and clichéd artistic gestures, is second only to movies about starving actors written and directed by actors, Garden State not withstanding. [25 July 2005]

Monkey Business: The True Story of the Scopes Trial by Dr. Marvin Olasky and John Perry

By Jodie Janella Horn

Olasky and Perry feel that creationists got a bad shake in the Scopes trial due to a liberal media bias, and that the time is nigh for a new battle. [12 July 2005]

Godlike by Richard Hell

By Jodie Janella Horn

The overall affect is the same as if your best friend called one day and said, 'An elephant walked into my apartment today and to get it out I had to beat up a rabbi,' and then hung up. [13 June 2005]