Music

Morrissey - "Ganglord" (video)

15 Mar 2010

Morrissey goes all Wings of Desire on his latest video, a tune from the 2009 b-sides compilation Swords. Craig Carson said of this song last year: "'Ganglord' takes on the LAPD, and his venom is palpable: 'They say 'to protect and serve' / But what they really need to say is / Get back to the ghetto.' Never one to mince words, the track reminds me of the vitriol of the Quarry track 'Irish Blood, English Heart', but with a more sinister overtone. Not too many musicians of his stature would offer such unvarnished, ugly truth via a pop song. It’s a positive attribute or an Achilles heel depending on the listener, but one that sets Morrissey apart in a sea of apolitical, empty-headed entertainers."

Video Morrissey

Music

Counterbalance No. 9: The Clash - 'London Calling'

Counterbalance offers up the right profile of the Clash's London Calling, an epic, sprawling disc that will leave you sprawled out on the floor as your mind tries to wrap itself around the sprawl of genres over the course of an hour plus.

Music

Bob Dylan's "Murder Most Foul" Is His First New Song Since the Nobel Laureate

Bob Dylan's "Murder Most Foul" is a 17-minute story song about JFK's assassination and a suitable audio dispatch from and for the end times.

Music

PopMatters Seeks Music Critics and Essayists

If you're a smart, historically-minded music critic or essayist, let your voice be heard by the quality readership of PopMatters.

Music

Rustin Man's 'Clockdust' Is Woozy Psych-Folk of Arresting and Fathomless Beauty

Arriving less than a year after Drift Code, Rustin Man consolidates a rich vein of form with the sepia-toned Clockdust, an autumnal record rendered generous and exquisite by each song's emotional weight.

Music

Basia Bulat Asks 'Are You in Love?'

Are You In Love? continues Basia Bulat's work with Jim James with equally excellent results but a slightly different theme about love in general.

Music

Dua Lipa's 'Future Nostalgia' Is the Dance Escape We Need Right Now

Engaged, confident, and better than ever, Dua Lipa's Future Nostalgia is a dancefloor fire-starter but just a shade away from being a true pop masterpiece.

Books

Providing Witness: Vasily Grossman's 'Stalingrad'

In Vasily Grossman, the lost and nameless victims of the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union – soldier and civilian, ordinary men and women – found their literary chronicler.

Books

Memoir 'Scratched' Seeks Beauty in the Flawed

Scratched: A Memoir of Perfectionism is a staggering depiction of the impact of psychological trauma written with breathless intensity.

Books

You Become the Watcher in Eric Haven's 'Cryptoid'

In his latest work, Cryptoid, Eric Haven takes an idiosyncratically weird approach to the horror genre of the Weird to produce a hybrid graphic novella that belongs to no genre but his own.

Books

When You Discover Your Father Had an Affair with Frida Kahlo...

The story of one of Frida Kahlo's short affairs, captured in Marc Petitjean's excellent book, The Heart, offers an inspired glimpse into the surreal Parisian art scene of 1939.

Film

The Road to Murder in Love and War: Three Films from Claude Chabrol

The character's in Claude Chabrol's The Third Lover, Line of Demarcation, and The Champagne Murders are obsessively doubled and mirrored, reflecting and refracting their hunger for sex, love, money, and power.

Film

What Lurks Beneath: 'Jaws' and Political Leadership in the Time of COVID-19

Boris Johnson admires the Mayor in Spielberg's Jaws. Remember him? He was the guy who wouldn't close the beaches -- and sacrifice that revenue source -- during a public crisis.

Film

'The Serpent's Egg' Marks One of Ingmar Bergman's Strangest Efforts

The Serpent's Egg bares many of the Bergman's trademark features – the suffocating auras of despair and an underdog's sense of triumph over tragedy – but falls short of a more intelligent rendering of human drama.

Recent

Film

The Road to Murder in Love and War: Three Films from Claude Chabrol

The character's in Claude Chabrol's The Third Lover, Line of Demarcation, and The Champagne Murders are obsessively doubled and mirrored, reflecting and refracting their hunger for sex, love, money, and power.

Music

The Weeknd - "In Your Eyes" (Singles Going Steady)

With "In Your Eyes", Toronto's premier Michael Jackson cosplayer, the Weeknd, has advanced his visual brand while parking his music in the summer of 1984.

Music

Bob Dylan's "Murder Most Foul" Is His First New Song Since the Nobel Laureate

Bob Dylan's "Murder Most Foul" is a 17-minute story song about JFK's assassination and a suitable audio dispatch from and for the end times.

Books

Providing Witness: Vasily Grossman's 'Stalingrad'

In Vasily Grossman, the lost and nameless victims of the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union – soldier and civilian, ordinary men and women – found their literary chronicler.

Music

Rustin Man's 'Clockdust' Is Woozy Psych-Folk of Arresting and Fathomless Beauty

Arriving less than a year after Drift Code, Rustin Man consolidates a rich vein of form with the sepia-toned Clockdust, an autumnal record rendered generous and exquisite by each song's emotional weight.

Music

Basia Bulat Asks 'Are You in Love?'

Are You In Love? continues Basia Bulat's work with Jim James with equally excellent results but a slightly different theme about love in general.

Music

Dua Lipa's 'Future Nostalgia' Is the Dance Escape We Need Right Now

Engaged, confident, and better than ever, Dua Lipa's Future Nostalgia is a dancefloor fire-starter but just a shade away from being a true pop masterpiece.

Music

Counterbalance No. 9: The Clash - 'London Calling'

Counterbalance offers up the right profile of the Clash's London Calling, an epic, sprawling disc that will leave you sprawled out on the floor as your mind tries to wrap itself around the sprawl of genres over the course of an hour plus.

Music

Experimental Rock's Trees Speak Summon Kosmische Sensations on 'Ohms'

On their inspiring second album, Ohms, Arizona avant-garde collective Trees Speak invoke the best of expansive electronica through motorik repetitions across a sprawling masterwork.

Music

Iceland Post-Rockers VAR Get Back to Basics With "Run" (premiere)

Post-rock band VAR share their latest single, "Run". It's dynamic, emotional, and filled an exuberance that recalls We Were Promised Jet Packs and Frightened Rabbit.

Books

Memoir 'Scratched' Seeks Beauty in the Flawed

Scratched: A Memoir of Perfectionism is a staggering depiction of the impact of psychological trauma written with breathless intensity.

Music

Whitney Rose Gets Stonesy With "In a Rut" (premiere + interview)

Texas singer-songwriter Whitney Rose turned a panic attack into the hook-laden "In a Rut" from her upcoming album, We Still Go to Rodeos.

Music

The Weeknd Gets Lost in Vegas on 'After Hours'

Despite After Hours' infectious blend of '80s synthpop and dark, alternative R&B, the story's beginning to get old on the Weeknd's fourth studio album.

Music

Nick Storring's 'My Magic Dreams Have Lost Their Spell' Is Beautiful, Haunting, and Otherworldly

Canadian composer Nick Storring's latest album, My Magic Dreams Have Lost Their Spell, is mysterious, multilayered, and unforgettable.

Music

Anna Calvi Re-writes Her Own History on 'Hunted'

With the help of some celebrity friends, Anna Calvi tinkers with her past and creates an alternate version of her last album.

Reviews

Collapse Expand Reviews

Features

The Road to Murder in Love and War: Three Films from Claude Chabrol

Collapse Expand Features

PM Picks

Collapse Expand Pm Picks

Morrissey - "Ganglord" (video)

There are various ways you can mine the bounty of your exquisite taste to while away an hour or two during this stressful time of coronavirus. But you've got to do it with some intentionality.

For all of the imagery that dominated the religiosity of David Bowie -- the fashion, the characters, the hairstyles -- what matters most are the songs. Here are 25 killer deep-cut Bowie originals, album by album.

Counterbalance offers up the right profile of the Clash's London Calling, an epic, sprawling disc that will leave you sprawled out on the floor as your mind tries to wrap itself around the sprawl of genres over the course of an hour plus.

Bob Dylan's "Murder Most Foul" is a 17-minute story song about JFK's assassination and a suitable audio dispatch from and for the end times.

If you're a smart, historically-minded music critic or essayist, let your voice be heard by the quality readership of PopMatters.

Arriving less than a year after Drift Code, Rustin Man consolidates a rich vein of form with the sepia-toned Clockdust, an autumnal record rendered generous and exquisite by each song's emotional weight.

Are You In Love? continues Basia Bulat's work with Jim James with equally excellent results but a slightly different theme about love in general.

Engaged, confident, and better than ever, Dua Lipa's Future Nostalgia is a dancefloor fire-starter but just a shade away from being a true pop masterpiece.

In Vasily Grossman, the lost and nameless victims of the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union – soldier and civilian, ordinary men and women – found their literary chronicler.

Scratched: A Memoir of Perfectionism is a staggering depiction of the impact of psychological trauma written with breathless intensity.

In his latest work, Cryptoid, Eric Haven takes an idiosyncratically weird approach to the horror genre of the Weird to produce a hybrid graphic novella that belongs to no genre but his own.

The story of one of Frida Kahlo's short affairs, captured in Marc Petitjean's excellent book, The Heart, offers an inspired glimpse into the surreal Parisian art scene of 1939.

The character's in Claude Chabrol's The Third Lover, Line of Demarcation, and The Champagne Murders are obsessively doubled and mirrored, reflecting and refracting their hunger for sex, love, money, and power.

We are afraid of time, and so like Leonard in Memento, we kill it, compulsively and indiscriminately.

Boris Johnson admires the Mayor in Spielberg's Jaws. Remember him? He was the guy who wouldn't close the beaches -- and sacrifice that revenue source -- during a public crisis.

The Serpent's Egg bares many of the Bergman's trademark features – the suffocating auras of despair and an underdog's sense of triumph over tragedy – but falls short of a more intelligent rendering of human drama.

The character's in Claude Chabrol's The Third Lover, Line of Demarcation, and The Champagne Murders are obsessively doubled and mirrored, reflecting and refracting their hunger for sex, love, money, and power.

For all of the imagery that dominated the religiosity of David Bowie -- the fashion, the characters, the hairstyles -- what matters most are the songs. Here are 25 killer deep-cut Bowie originals, album by album.

With "In Your Eyes", Toronto's premier Michael Jackson cosplayer, the Weeknd, has advanced his visual brand while parking his music in the summer of 1984.

There are various ways you can mine the bounty of your exquisite taste to while away an hour or two during this stressful time of coronavirus. But you've got to do it with some intentionality.

Bob Dylan's "Murder Most Foul" is a 17-minute story song about JFK's assassination and a suitable audio dispatch from and for the end times.

In Vasily Grossman, the lost and nameless victims of the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union – soldier and civilian, ordinary men and women – found their literary chronicler.

Arriving less than a year after Drift Code, Rustin Man consolidates a rich vein of form with the sepia-toned Clockdust, an autumnal record rendered generous and exquisite by each song's emotional weight.

Are You In Love? continues Basia Bulat's work with Jim James with equally excellent results but a slightly different theme about love in general.

Engaged, confident, and better than ever, Dua Lipa's Future Nostalgia is a dancefloor fire-starter but just a shade away from being a true pop masterpiece.

Counterbalance offers up the right profile of the Clash's London Calling, an epic, sprawling disc that will leave you sprawled out on the floor as your mind tries to wrap itself around the sprawl of genres over the course of an hour plus.

On their inspiring second album, Ohms, Arizona avant-garde collective Trees Speak invoke the best of expansive electronica through motorik repetitions across a sprawling masterwork.

Post-rock band VAR share their latest single, "Run". It's dynamic, emotional, and filled an exuberance that recalls We Were Promised Jet Packs and Frightened Rabbit.

Scratched: A Memoir of Perfectionism is a staggering depiction of the impact of psychological trauma written with breathless intensity.

We are afraid of time, and so like Leonard in Memento, we kill it, compulsively and indiscriminately.

Texas singer-songwriter Whitney Rose turned a panic attack into the hook-laden "In a Rut" from her upcoming album, We Still Go to Rodeos.

Despite After Hours' infectious blend of '80s synthpop and dark, alternative R&B, the story's beginning to get old on the Weeknd's fourth studio album.

Canadian composer Nick Storring's latest album, My Magic Dreams Have Lost Their Spell, is mysterious, multilayered, and unforgettable.

With the help of some celebrity friends, Anna Calvi tinkers with her past and creates an alternate version of her last album.