BLACK POSTCARDS
By Dean Wareham
Penguin Press, 324 pages, $25.95
Another slog through Europe, and Dean Wareham, respected, almost-famous singer and guitarist, is finally realizing that elusive rock ’n’ roll fantasy. An Andalusian beauty with a “fantastic chest” is making eyes at him through the whole show. Afterward, she takes him home. She’s Read More
Red Hook, along with the rest of latter-day South Brooklyn, continues to be dragged upward (hello, Fairway?), but vestiges do remain of a not-so-distant past when longshoremen outnumbered loft conversions. On a forlorn stretch of Columbia Street between the Red Hook Houses and the Battery Tunnel toll plaza, red and green block letters above an Read More
A chorus on Bonnie “Prince” Billy’s new record, The Letting Go (Drag City), begins with a familiar apostrophe: “O love o love o careless love.” In the most desperate stanza of Robert Lowell’s “Skunk Hour,” a car radio bleats the same refrain from the old folk song, a dark piece of Americana about the unforeseen Read More
A chorus on Bonnie “Prince” Billy’s new record, The Letting Go (Drag City), begins with a familiar apostrophe: “O love o love o careless love.” In the most desperate stanza of Robert Lowell’s “Skunk Hour,” a car radio bleats the same refrain from the old folk song, a dark piece of Americana about the unforeseen Read More
In the beginning of September, Beyoncé celebrated her birthday and Justin Timberlake brought the sexy back. For the rest of the month, we’ll have to make do with releases from more, ahem, autumnal performers: Janet Jackson, if you’re nasty; Alan Jackson, if you’re Nashville; and the earnest singer-songwriting of the Indigo Girls and Elton John. Read More
In the beginning of September, Beyoncé celebrated her birthday and Justin Timberlake brought the sexy back. For the rest of the month, we’ll have to make do with releases from more, ahem, autumnal performers: Janet Jackson, if you’re nasty; Alan Jackson, if you’re Nashville; and the earnest singer-songwriting of the Indigo Girls and Elton John. Read More
Revivals of long-gone genres are nothing unexpected. Even awkward, pretentious prog rock emerged from its attic hiding place some time ago, so it’s no surprise that its smoother 70’s sibling—lavishly produced, folk-inflected soft rock—is making a reappearance. The remarkable thing is that there’s a great album heralding that return, one that steers clear of ironic Read More
Revivals of long-gone genres are nothing unexpected. Even awkward, pretentious prog rock emerged from its attic hiding place some time ago, so it’s no surprise that its smoother 70’s sibling—lavishly produced, folk-inflected soft rock—is making a reappearance. The remarkable thing is that there’s a great album heralding that return, one that steers clear of ironic Read More
You’re not likely to hear a Sufjan Stevens song floating out of the tinny hidden speakers next time you step into an elevator or a waiting room, but it wouldn’t be surprising to catch some of his music playing at the coffeehouse or spliced between segments on NPR. Despite his serious artistic ambitions and undeniable Read More
You’re not likely to hear a Sufjan Stevens song floating out of the tinny hidden speakers next time you step into an elevator or a waiting room, but it wouldn’t be surprising to catch some of his music playing at the coffeehouse or spliced between segments on NPR. Despite his serious artistic ambitions and undeniable Read More
