Apparently drama works in daytime. E-Poll Market Research has released a study (unscientific, it would seem) of the most politically divisive celebrities–those preferred disproportionately by either Republicans or Democrats. Elisabeth Hasselbeck, the conservative voice on The View, is the most disproportionately loved by GOP members–with a difference of 51 percent in her approval by right- Read More
On a frosty New Year’s Day in 1953, a life of genetic back trouble and spinal pain exacerbated by drugs, alcohol and self-abuse took their toll on a man in a white cowboy hat, slumped in the back seat of a powder blue Cadillac Eldorado convertible. Hank Williams died, holding a guitar and a notebook of unfinished song lyrics. The king of country music was 29 years old. He was on his way to a comeback, traveling from Montgomery, Ala., to sold-out shows in West Virginia and Canton, Ohio, in a blinding snowstorm, with a high-school dropout who didn’t even know who he was in the driver’s seat. The Last Ride, carefully directed by Harry Thomason and skillfully written with chords and spaces for humming and breathing by Howie Klausner and Dub Cornett, hauntingly and sensitively negotiates the final three days in the life and death of a legendary character of mythic proportions, warts and all. Read More
Sometimes we like to imagine what life would be like if everything had turned out differently—if everything we’d wished for this week had actually come true. We like to imagine, for instance, that we’d be in line for the new iPhone 5 and that it would be so shiny and magical that it wouldn’t matter that we still get no reception anywhere in Manhattan where you’d actually need to make a phone call. We like to imagine that Chris Christie is running for President because we like outsized… personalities. (We’ve sprained all of our extraocular muscles rolling our eyes at Michelle Bachmann but she seems to have more staying power than Mitt Romney’s hair gel.) We like to imagine Derek Jeter hammering some of Justin Verlander’s 100 mph fastballs into the nosebleed seats at Comerica Park. We like to imagine that Girl Scout Council employees are paragons of public service and would never, ever embezzle $310,000 of organizational cookie money for cosmetic laser procedures and cruises.
But, alas, none of it’s true. Read More
At the age of 43, Afel Bocoum, a singer, guitarist, songwriter and farmer, has made his debut album, Alkibar (“Messenger of the Great River”), and it’s a wonder.
This isn’t good-time music. It comes from Mali, a landlocked, drought-stricken country in West Africa. Played with acoustic instruments and gentle percussion, Alkibar has a modest sound, Read More
