ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY:Once upon a time, many months and Lana Del Rey posts ago, we asked Aubrey Plaza what was on her iPod. The Parks and Recreation actress tipped us off to the then-unreleased “Hollywood Forever Cemetery” from J. Tillman, formerly of the Fleet Foxes, and mentioned that she’d be starring in its video. Under the moniker Father John Misty, Tillman has released the song (now titled ”Hollywood Forever Cemetery Sings”) as the lead single off his forthcoming debut Fear Fun (out May 1), as well as a video to match. Named for one L.A.’s oldest burial grounds, the droney psych-rock dirge is a bit of […]
BLOOD SPORT: The Crucifixion Of Lana Del Rey
NMA TV: Lana Del Rey’s new album Born to Die has been panned by Billboard, Spin, Pitchfork and Stereogum. Video Games, voted best song of 2011 by the Guardian, was the first we heard of Lana Del Rey, but subsequent performances, including an appearance on Saturday Night Life, have been terrible. Her performance on SNL was so bad Brian Williams wrote an email to Gawker calling her a “Brooklyn hippster [sic]” and her performance “one of the worst outings in SNL history.” Juliette Lewis also tweeted negatively about her performance. Del Rey fans say her songs are good and she […]
NPR FOR THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When U Can’t
FRESH AIR: Once the drummer for the grunge band Nirvana, Dave Grohl formed Foo Fighters after the death of Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain in 1994. Foo Fighters’ sixth album, Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace, includes a song Grohl wrote for two miners who, trapped in an Australia mine collapse, asked rescuers to send down an iPod loaded with Foo Fighters songs. Grohl sent them a note, then met with one of the miners after they were rescued. Grohl is a percussionist, guitarist and songwriter — and an actor, having appeared both on Tenacious D’s debut album and in the 2006 movie […]
Is Special K The Miracle Cure For Depression?
TALK OF THE NATION: Almost as soon as it was introduced in 1987, the antidepressant Prozac, which selectively targets the chemical serotonin, became a blockbuster. “Prozac just blew everything else out of the water,” Frazer says. This had less to do with the efficacy of Prozac (it is not better at treating depression than tricyclics, the earlier generation of antidepressants) than with the fact that the drug had relatively few side effects. “It was very free of side effects,” says Pedro Delgado. “And so it began to be used very widely, and there was a lot of enthusiasm for it.” […]
SIDEWALKING: Caveman Blues
From Gomez + Gonzalez, Presented By Philagrafika, Galleries At Moore, Moore College Of Art & Design, Friday 7:01 PM by JONATHAN VALANIA
ARTSY: The Afterlife Of Vivian Maier
BY MIKE WALSH In 1951, at age 25, a young woman named Vivian Maier moved from France to New York City, where she worked for some time in a sweat shop. Maier also had a camera, and she spent much of her free time walking around NYC working class neighborhoods taking photos of people, places, and buildings. She used a Rolleiflex camera, the type you look down into a two-inch lens to aim and focus. It used 120 mm film, a large format that, in the hands of someone like Maier, can capture incredible richness, detail, and depth of field. […]
SIDEWALKING: Horse Latitudes
48th & Lancaster, 5 PM Sunday by JEFF FUSCO
SH*T MY UNCLE SAYS: The Dark Art Of Convincing White Middle Class America To Vote Against Itself
[Click to enlarge] BY WILLIAM C. HENRY Rarely has a political party so craftily cozened a majority of its naive yet trusting adherents as has the current Republican edition with its sham economic policies. Take for example convincing their blue- (and even many white–) collar disciples that a further lessening of the already absurdly low tax burden on the wealthy — many of whom for nearly a decade have paid an unconscionably lower percentage of their income in taxes than middle-class wage earners — will assuredly result in a mutually beneficial “trickling down” of vast improvement to their already-shattered-by-the-VERY-SAME-POLICIES lives. No doubt, but watch […]
DEJA VU: Inquirer/Daily News Up For Sale AGAIN?
. INQUIRER: A minority shareholder of the parent company of The Inquirer and Philadelphia Daily News is looking to sell its 30 percent stake, according to a story in the New York Post Alden Global Capital, a New York hedge fund that holds interests in several newspapers, was one of 32 investors that acquired the two daily newspapers and Philly.com for $139 million in October 2010. Now the owners of Philadelphia Media Network Inc. are “in the middle of an auction” to sell the company for roughly $100 million, according to the Post story, which cited a source close to […]
KILLADELPHIA: Same As It Ever Was
DAILY BEAST: Thirty-two murders that have taken place in Philadelphia since the start of 2012. This recent rash of homicides comes quickly on the heels of a year when Mayor Michael Nutter and Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey were touting a steep reduction in violent crime, with homicides down 22 percent, robberies down 23 percent, and overall violent crime down 16 percent in 2011 from their 2007 highs. The Mayor blames the homicide spike on a steady flow of illegal handguns into the city as groups like the NRA stymie his attempts to pass local gun-control laws. Richard Berk, a statistician […]
EARLY WORD: Dave The Goliath
BY ZIVIT SHLANK Composer/pianist Dave Burrell is an American original. He first made his mark at the inception of the avant-garde and free music movements in the 1960s. Over 30 years, 115 recordings and counting, numerous television and radio appearances, countless performances worldwide, Burrell shows no signs of slowing down. January features Burrell in two very different settings. Artist-in-residence with the Rosenbach Museum and Library since 2007, his latest task was to create music for an elaborate five-part research project on the Civil War. Part 2 entitled Civilians During War Time, made its world premiere on January 18, with two […]
150 Killed In Syria Over The Weekend; Govt. Troops Reclaim Suburbs Of Damascus From Insurgents
THE GUARDIAN: Troops seized back eastern suburbs of Damascus from rebels late on Sunday after an unprecedented operation that saw around 2,000 troops, at least 50 tanks and armoured vehicles flood the area, according to activists. An activist named Kamal, in the eastern al-Ghouta area on the edge of the capital, told Reuters: The Free Syrian Army has made a tactical withdrawal. Regime forces have re-occupied the suburbs and started making house-to-house arrests. Maher al-Naimi, a spokesman for the Free Syrian Army of defectors fighting Assad’s forces, appeared to confirm that account: Tanks have gone in but they do not […]