Wednesday, October 19 2011
Albert Ayler: Love Cry / The Last Album
Even when Albert Ayler was "selling out", his music was tough to swallow. This reissue twofer goes right to the heart of that paradox.
Friday, September 23 2011
The Bad News Statisticians: ‘Moneyball’
There’s an ugly and unromantic truth behind Bennett Miller’s baseball stats semi-comedy Moneyball that it acknowledges and then dances away from.
Friday, September 2 2011
It’s Yesterday Once More in ‘Little Girl Blue’
Little Girl Blue is a damning and penetrating account of tortured and tormented artist, Karen Carpenter, and could just be one of the most depressing books you’ll ever read.
Friday, July 15 2011
A Great Unrecorded History: A New Life of E.M. Forster
All his life Morgan Forster lived in a world imprisoned by prejudice against homosexuals. He was 16 when Oscar Wilde was sent to prison, and he died the year after the Stonewall riots.
David S. Ware/Cooper-Moore/William Parker/Muhammad Ali: Planetary Unknown
These four guys have known each other for years, yet this is the first album to feature all of them in the same room. Calling it a "doozy" is just a playful, feeble understatement.
Monday, March 21 2011
Botticelli, Sandwiches Outside and Dreams of Bradbury’s ‘Dandelion Wine’
Boxed in by bandage-colored cubicle walls in downtown Manhattan, my thoughts drift to sweet days in Florence and Rome, and to lines in Ray Bradbury’s ‘Dandelion Wine’.
Friday, November 12 2010
Hüsker Dü: The Story of the Noise-Pop Pioneers Who Launched Modern Rock
What the world really needs is a straight-up account of one of the most important rock groups of all time. Now we have it in the form of music scribe Andrew Earles.
Thursday, February 18 2010
ESPN: Changing the Way Americans Think About Sports
ESPN changed the course of American sports culture by providing access to national and international events 24 hours per day and cultivating the entertainment potential of sporting events and personalities.
Thursday, February 11 2010
High Society: The Life of Grace Kelly by Donald Spoto
In his biography of Grace Kelly, Donald Spoto spends much time trying to polish a gem that shines all on its own.
Friday, January 15 2010
The Last Empress: Madame Chiang Kai-shek and the Birth of Modern China by Hannah Pakula
The Chiangs were an historical anachronism; their reign marked by corruption, ineptitude, and a quasi-Fascist nationalism that could not survive for long.
