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Elliott Smith, News, Opinion

A Second Opinion On Elliott Smith’s Autopsy Report

Stabbing is a very painful way to kill yourself. Those who commit suicide by knife tend to have very deep personality disturbances. And it is more difficult to stab oneself through clothing, requires a lot of strength to do that to yourself (unless the clothing is a thin T-shirt). Being very depressed won’t make it any less painful. There WILL be hesitation marks.

News, Opinion, Slideshow

“Carrie And Lowell” Hits Awful Close To Home

That is a question that goes to the heart of our insecurities, it is the unanswerable, unequivicable question between adults and children. Do you love me? Really? Do you love me enough? How much? How often? Why? Why not? Carrie And Lowell has no answers for Sufjan or us, but it has the right questions, and the right concerns and that is so rare, so important. It illuminates who we are.

controversy, News, Slideshow

Miley Cyrus, A Good Trouble Maker For Once

She called Indiana governor Mike Pence an asshole on Instagram, because he passed a controversial bill on March 26th, prohibiting state and local governments from hindering a person’s right to practice their religion… Although the bill doesn’t specifically mention sexual orientation, many worry it will also make it possible for employers to discriminate against gay candidates

News, Slideshow

Jack Antonoff To Play Indiana

“They’ve been tweeting some pretty rude stuff at me, so I think there’s a sect of America out there that doesn’t like certain opinions and can really take their claws out when they don’t like what you’re saying.” though you voted

News, Slideshow

That Was The Week That Was: March 30th, 2015

The problem with Saints is there aren’t too many of them around and god knows John Lennon was more human than most so his sainthood is a little, how you say, disillusioning. When people speak of Lennon, they miss something: he was a serial philanderer, a wife beater, he neglected his son Julian, and he had a violent streak. But here is the kicker: he changed. The wife being beaten was Cynthia Lennon (and it was their child Julian being ignored). Cynthia died last week from cancer at the age of 75.

News, Opinion, Slideshow, Streaming

Let’s Take The Tidal Sound Test

There is a very simple test you can do on Tidal, it allows you to play five songs (you don’t pick the songs, and I got the Killers, James Blake, Daft Punk, the Eagles and the Dixie Chicks) using two sound sources A and B. You can switch back and forth between A and B during the short music sample, then determine which of the two is the high fidelity sound source. I was using my Macbook connected to a Logitech speaker system. I paid around $40 for them and they sound okay for me, but I did very badly at the test, I guessed 2 out of 5 correctly!! Not bad? Are they kidding?

News, Slideshow

The Music Stars’ Dating Game

Taylor Swift was spotted in Los Angeles at a Haim concert at the Troubadour on Thursday…. And she was holding hands with Calvin Harris… the world’s highest paid DJ with the world’s highest paid pop star, what a power couple! And both highly overrated! But we already know it won’t last for very long.

News, Slideshow

My Meeting with Brian Wilson(or how I grew up to be a man and love “The Bomb”)

When I was ushered in, I showed Brian a pic on my phone of a painting I did of him that he signed in Long Beach. He said he dug it and that he remembered seeing it. Well, that was pretty bitchen’ to say the least. Again, here was my musical hero and I hardly had much to say to him. What do you say to a modern day Mozart or Beethoven? What do you say to a musical genius?

Movies, News

“Furious Seven” Reviewed

The action sequences are pretty spectacular with cars being dropped from planes and hitting the Caucasus Mountains at full speed, a Maserati leaping from one high rise to another in Abu Dhabi, and a high speed chase in the streets of L.A. before Jason and Vin battle it out mano a mano.

News, Slideshow, The Big Huerta

The Big Huerta Hails a Cab Calloway

I painted a woe looking, dizzy Cab, sort of hoping that the jive *ss peeps stop the hepness and just power down the grape without all the posing fanfare. I figured Cab is short for Cabernet. The swirling world is painted in muted metallics because I wanted to and also I like shiny things and you all should like shiny things too!

News, Slideshow

Moby’s Future Vegan Eatery In Silverlake

Let’s hope Moby’s enterprise will not be among these failures, I just wonder whether he has more of a Jay Z-Bono-Timberlake business sense than a Spears-Lopez-Hynde’s. One thing is sure I would die rather than trying Keith or Queen Latifah’s greasy meat, but I may check out Moby’s vegan place this summer.

News, Slideshow

Jay Z Launches Tidal, His New Streaming Service

Jay Z recently purchased the streaming service for some $56 million and he wants to make it as a competitor to Spotify, or Rdio. Alicia called it the ‘beginning of a whole new era’,… but for whom exactly? A new era for Jay Z and Madonna to make even more money? What’s new exactly? A new sound? a better listening experience?

News, Opinion, Slideshow

Oldies But Goldies: In The Wake Of My Zayn Malik Post, Here is Something I Wrote In 1988

Arabs aren’t the only, and not even the biggest, objects of rock racism. In ’76, mindless punks wore swastikas at English concerts (swastikas adorned the label of Vicious’s pathetic Sid Sings). Siouxsie Sioux used to sing “too many Jews for my liking.” By the time punk had passed, an English offspring called “Oi” aligned themselves with the fascist party, the National Front. The NF advocated Pakistani bashing and sending the West Indians back to where they came from

Movies, News, Slideshow

Christopher Nolan’s “Interstellar” Reviewed

I enjoyed it to a limited degree, despite not being a big fan of anybody in it, except for the three actors playing his daughter Murph. The punchline works, it is a clever pay off, and the script, by Christopher and his brother Jonathan Nolan, has a satisfying tick tock (apt for a movie obsessed with gravity as a type of time machine

News, Slideshow

Sister Rosetta Tharpe – The Pride of Cotton Plant, Arkansas

Sister Rosetta Tharpe had a complicated relationship with religion – she was born into the business of religion and when she performed secular music, it was always at the risk of alienating her core audience. Late in her life she stated that she wasn’t a “fanatical believer,” although that may have been more of a casual comment than a reflection of her core convictions.

News

Jonathan Shaw At La Luz De Jesus, Friday March 27th 2015

Shaw read a few excerpt of his book, spoken word style, accompanied by some music by Gregg Foreman of Cat Power, and Brandon Burkart of The Saint James Society. The funny thing is that he was reading most of it from his phone (he wrote his whole book on his phone as he is allergic to computers)

News, Slideshow

That Was The Week That Was: March 23rd, 2015

On the eighth of a nine performance New York residency over the month of March, Bjork performed six songs from her new album of lost love and complicated feelings, took a break, and returned a brand new woman for the second set. It is called Catharsis… or art… or something.

News, Slideshow

Will Everybody At Concerts Shut Up

The rule of thumb is, if you at a standing room only gig and you are near the stage shut up, if you’re in the back, well, ok, we can live with it. This is no longer the case. This is reaching epidemic proportions, silence please. A concert is not the time or place to discuss Daddy’s operation or Mary’s divorce so shut up and let me watch the show in peace.

News, Slideshow

Willie Nelson’s Weed In A Store Near You Soon

There will be stores (where marijuana has become legal, states like Colorado or Washington) that will sell Willie’s weed. Furthermore, it’s not going be exclusively Nelson’s production, he obviously wants to grow his own, but there will be ‘opportunities for other growers, who meet quality standards’

Movies, News, Slideshow

Cliff Richard’s “Summer Holiday” Reviewed

I read an article about a 100 year old man explaining how the world looks in extreme old age, how you forget how love feels, how love felt, how life in youth was, except in dreams, and I would if except in music and movies where the extremeness of returning precisely to the past might not trigger something in you.

News, Slideshow

Personal Managers Hall Of Fame Inductees 2015

Where would the Beatles be without Brian Epstein? The Stones without Andrew Loog Oldham, or Elvis Presley without the Colonel? Artists need managers, and there have been some as big as the stars themselves… for better, Malcolm Mclaren, or for worse, Allen Klein, they are all the fifth Beatle.

News, Opinion, Slideshow

No New York

The bottom of the barrel was Monday evening. No “L” train to Brooklyn, a good 90 minute trip to the club, the doors are at 8pm, opening act, figure it is over 11p to 1130p and then what? If I get home by one it will be a miracle ad then not just work but work and the new releases tomorrow.

News

Hear Satellite Sky’s New Song ‘Next Time’

Satellite Sky is a new Australian duo featuring Pete Kicks and Kim Kicks and what more do you want to know when they already have this last name? Yes, they kick ass on vocals, guitar and drums, yes, they are brother and sister and yes, the girl is on drums just like another famous rock duo who were just faking their siblingness.

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