Music
Kanye West's new album is raw, unapologetic—and boring
The music of George Jones is an argument against the intellect, a case for art made without the mediating influence of the mind. For decades before his death in April at the age of eighty-one, Jones had been widely regarded as one of the greatest singers in country music, if not the greatest ever in his field; but even that exalted status may have undersold him. He was, I think, one of the most distinctive and effective vocalists in the whole history of American music, category notwithstanding.
Matt Damon is the real star of this Liberace biopic.
The Miseducation of Stan Veuger
Conservatives' hilarious attempt to appropriate rap music
Once a year, some conservative media outlet feels peeved about the arts and publishes a listicle enumerating how a certain form or genre is inherently—often secretly—conservative. These exercises are mostly absurd, shouting out, "We will not be silenced!" when there is no danger of that at all. This year, rap got added to the list.
Every year, the tech elite and their legions of hangers-on gather in Austin to binge-network, binge-drink and "change the world." It is glorious. It is absurd. It is South by Southwest.
Meow Meow and the rise of alt-cabaret.
The basic premise of One-Man Focus Group is that cultural criticism shouldn't be the exclusive province of cinema, literature, music, and the like. Given the proper perspective and the presence of a reasonably articulate observer, virtually anything can be subjected to insightful, illuminating critique. Or at least that's the idea.
Comebacks are sometimes acts of recovery, sometimes rediscovery. The Next Day is both.
Donald Byrd's jazz-pop-funk mix foreshadowed the hybridization of music in the digital era.
Box-sets, reunion tours, lavishly art-directed re-issues, on-stage jams with surviving Beatles. Yesteryear's alt-rockers are growing old in exactly the same ways as the 1970s dinosaurs they once mocked. Why that's not a bad thing.
