Friday, May 25 2012
Flash Points: Chicks, Sluts and Facebook
This week Flash Points looks at the release of a controversial book sexually 'profiling' women, the slut shaming of Rihanna, and the poor showing of Facebook's IPO.
Friday, May 18 2012
Flash Points: Mommy’s Breast, Marriage Equality and Why Chipotle Is King
Welcome to the first edition of Flash Points -- a new weekly feature that provides a critical overview of cultural trends and developments. This week: the controversial Time cover, the gay marriage debate and the annual CLIOs.
Tuesday, May 15 2012
20 Questions: Kate Bornstein
"I was a Scientologist for 12 years, which is a lot more embarrassing than saying Hi, I’m a transsexual SM dyke living with borderline personality disorder," Kate Bornstein tells PopMatters 20 Questions on the release of her memoir, A Queer and Pleasant Danger.
Friday, April 27 2012
The Sklar Brothers: The Hardest-Working Twins in Showbiz
In the time it took you to finish this sentence, Randy and Jason Sklar have already come up with 10 jokes about LeBron James.
Monday, April 16 2012
If You Had Ears, You Could Not Ignore It: Mainstream Responses to Punk
When punk assailed pop in the late '70s, established artists faced a choice: respond with conviction or face irrelevance.
Thursday, March 15 2012
Revisiting ‘The Bodyguard’: A Romantic Blockbuster for Adults
The legacy of the The Bodyguard, beyond the greatness of Whitney, the vision of Kasdan, and the wisdom of Costner, is that it's possible to please the public and produce profit on a massive scale by intelligently presenting the complexities of adult love.
Tuesday, February 28 2012
Bill Frisell on John Lennon: Talking About ‘All We Are Saying’
The unique jazz guitarist talks about All We Are Saying -- his recent cover album of 16 John Lennon tunes -- as well as how the Beatles changed his life, and how back in the day, owning an instrument meant you were automatically in a band.
Tuesday, February 21 2012
Man and Mega Man: Better Living Through Retro Game Demos on YouTube
Mega Man blipped back to his control center and I blipped too. I got pulled out of myself, out of my kitchen, and was thrust back into something wholly new yet remarkably the same. This is not the story of my decline. This is the story of how to make it through life without taking any damage.
Tuesday, February 14 2012
My Indie Is Not a Centerfold, Nor Is It Indie
What has come to be known as indie music cannot be recorded and released in places where people are absolutely independent. We need to start thinking -- really, seriously thinking -- about how something that is supposed to be inherently independent can be so dependent on so much else.
Tuesday, February 7 2012
Mitt Romney Can Reside at Today’s Proverbial ‘Downton Abbey’... Newt Gingrich Cannot
Downton Abbey reveals not only the play of chance that often confounds choice, but the power of social class to confine choice within established boundaries -- and we're comfortable with that.
Thursday, February 2 2012
After Cease to Exist: The Far-from-Final Report of Throbbing Gristle
After a British government official declared them "Wreckers of Civilization", Throbbing Gristle understood their mission -- to destroy the Control society.
Wednesday, January 25 2012
Circling the Sun Machine: Re-thinking David Bowie’s ‘Space Oddity’
Bowie's odd magnetism has long been interpreted as a function of his ambiguous sexuality, but could it be that he was transgressing more than just gender norms and heralding the rise of the man/machine?
Wednesday, January 18 2012
Writing the Story of the World (and Wearing It, Too!)
This is a force of energy with a lot of moving parts. The goal is to write the story of the world.
Tuesday, January 3 2012
Occupying Video: The Underbelly of Globalization Caught on Camera
Occupy Wall Street's strength might be how it enables diverse constituencies to seize upon its imagery and message to engage with social justice concerns, both on the ground and within the video.
Wednesday, November 23 2011
The Revolution Will Be Amplified: Is the Occupy Movement Liberating Music?
Forty years from now, people will be writing books on the art and music, literature and culture that came out of the Occupy Wall Street / Occupy Everything movements.
Tuesday, October 18 2011
‘Screamadelica’ and the Altered State
In the context of Primal Scream's prior and subsequent career, Screamadelica is a miracle.
Monday, October 17 2011
The Last Bullfight in Catalonia
The bullfighter, who only minutes beforehand faced death with grace and fearlessness, covers his face and begins to cry. He is the triumphant hero of a collective failure.
Tuesday, October 4 2011
20 Questions: William Shatner
William Shatner, Captain Kirk, Cultural Icon Extraordinaire. Shatner Rules. Like all great American actors – he’s not American. We’re not even sure he’s human. We’re certain, however, that he’s The Captain of Everything -- not least PopMatters 20 Questions.
Thursday, September 22 2011
Michael Has Issues: A Sad Sad Conversation with Michael Ian Black
Michael Ian Black -- of The State, Stella, and Michael & Michael Have Issues fame -- discusses his new album, Very Famous, and connecting to people through sad, sad conversations ...
Tuesday, September 20 2011
Five Ways to Kill a Hipster? A Critique of Anti-Hipsterism
When men and/or white people, with gender and racial power over their counterparts, ridicule these cultural acts with disregard for what they mean to the originators, then an anti-hipster response has the capacity to be racist and sexist.
