RICH ASSHOLES PAYING NO TAXES IS UNPATRIOTIC
Sean Murphy* Did you catch this? (Trigger warning: you’ll need to Windex your screen and take a shower after watching to disinfect and rinse the slime off.) This embarrassing exchange merely…
John Coltrane at 90
For those whose definition of genius is either too encompassing or excessively narrow, John Coltrane poses no problems: there isn’t anyone who knows anything about music (in general) and jazz…
Taxi Driver: 40 Thoughts for 40 Years
Not many critics would name it as the best American movie, and it probably would rank as few fans’ favorite films. Is Taxi Driver, nevertheless, the most important American film?…
Led Zeppelin: Day by Day
Imagine Led Zeppelin in our contemporary culture, with smart phones and social media documenting their every activity and utterance—a ceaseless spectacle. It’s impossible. Literally; obviously. But it’s possible that the…
The Weeklings: Final Popped Culture
In this much-beloved feature launched for the very final time, our editors and contributors each respond to a single cultural question. As always, please, no wagering. Five years later,…
10 for NYC by 10, on 9/11
New York City would be unimaginable without jazz, and vice versa. Here then is a tribute for --and by-- several musicians who help define and celebrate the cultural mecca of…
End of Summer (Camp) with a Bat, a Cat and a Clown
IT IS AN INEXORABLE, if lamentable rite of passage: revisiting mementos from one’s childhood and discovering that, to an adult’s eyes, they’re lacking. But then, “putting away childish things” is…
Sanctuary
I visited my mother’s grave the first several years for the same reason I used to attend church: it was expected, it was meant to make me feel better, it…
For My Mother on Her Birthday
I’m scared, I said. “It’s okay,” she said. “You know I’ll never leave you, right? I would never leave this place without you.” How many times did she tell me…
Bobby Hutcherson: Thanks for the Good Vibes
Bobby Hutcherson was not just a major, and positive force for good in the jazz idiom, he was a genuine innovator. Before him, the vibraphone was largely considered a novelty…