THE COLONEL REMEMBERS: Pictures Of Lily Philly

EDITOR’S NOTE: Sad, sad news. We received word on Sunday that Tom Sheehy, aka The Colonel — longtime Philly music publicist/scenester/historian, storied music biz vet, barroom philosopher, perennial guest list fixture, late-blooming recipient of a P.H.D. in 20th Century American History from Penn, colonel in the ‘MMaRmy, and frequent Phawker contributor — passed away this weekend. This week we will honor his memory by re-posting some of his greatest Phawker hits. Today we’re re-posting The Colonel’s 2011 remembrance of (almost) seeing The Who and The Pink Floyd at JFK Stadium in 1968. MORE BY COLONEL TOM SHEEHY If you think […]

THE COLONEL REMEMBERS: The Beatles At JFK

[Photos of The Beatles backstage at JFK by BOB BONIS courtesy of NFAgallery.com] EDITOR’S NOTE: Sad, sad news. We received word on Sunday that Tom Sheehy, aka The Colonel — longtime Philly music publicist/scenester/historian, storied music biz vet, barroom philosopher, perennial guest list fixture, late-blooming recipient of a Ph.D. in 20th Century American History from Penn, colonel in the ‘MMaRmy, and frequent Phawker contributor — passed away this weekend. This week we will honor his memory by re-posting some of his greatest Phawker hits. Today we’re re-posting The Colonel’s 2011 remembrance of seeing The Beatles at JFK in 1966. MORE […]

THE COLONEL REMEMBERS: Me & Keef

EDITOR’S NOTE: Sad, sad news. We received word today that Tom Sheehy, aka The Colonel — longtime Philly music publicist/scenester/historian, storied music biz vet, barroom philosopher, perennial guest list fixture, late-blooming recipient of a Ph.D. in 20th Century American History from Penn, colonel in the ‘MMaRmy, and frequent Phawker contributor — passed away this weekend. This week we will honor his memory by re-posting some of his greatest Phawker hits. We begin with his beloved Rolling Stones and the time he snuck into Keith Richards hotel room in New York in 1969. We will also be re-posting his remembrances of […]

MT VENGEANCE: May Day

PREVIOUSLY: The ’90s were a helluva drug. You really had to be there, kid, but suffice it to say it was 10 years of unprecedented peace and prosperity, a pot in every chicken, 2.5 SUVs in every garage, a Clinton was president and Donald Trump ran beauty contests instead of the free world. In the ’90s, the Internet went public and we all become tech stock billionaires overnight — all of us — selling dog bones over the World Wide Web, which was what we called the Interwebs back then, as was the style of the day. Good. Times. Music […]

DISPATCHES: My Life Under Quarantine

The author sheltering-in-place in an island paradise. Photo by David Collins BY DILLON ALEXANDER When I got a job teaching high school social studies in Hawaii, people tried to scare me with stories of island fever. Having lived here, on the most remote island chain in the world, for almost two years, I had a few pangs, but nothing to write home about. Now take that island fever, and add a pandemic and consequent mandatory-shelter-in-place order, and what do you have? Island Fever + Cabin Fever = Total Insanity? No, not for me. But I’m lucky and I know it. […]

DISPATCHES: My Life Under Quarantine

EDITOR’S NOTE: We’ve asked Phawker contributors to send in dispatches describing their lives under quarantine. Enjoy. BY DYLAN LONG I got let off of work in the middle of my shift. We turned the lights off and began disinfecting the store for a final time. Card readers, chairs, counters, clothing racks, the works. Rumors floated about that the whole city was shutting down. It was mid-March. Our store’s shutting down felt overdue, but thankfully, the company I work for was giving us two weeks paid leave. I left work and walked straight down to the Wine & Spirits store, which […]

DISPATCHES: My Life Under Quarantine

Photo by JOHN WEINSTEIN BY KYLE WEINSTEIN I was student teaching 10th graders at a charter school in Philly when they closed the schools. Up until then, I was drowning in sub-par essays with thesis statements like “Through the use of symbolism in which represents love illustrates that love could be real but also hurtful,” and supporting topic sentences like “First, Shakespeare is fake.” My temples have been rubbed raw and my brow muscles are Hulked-up from excessive furrowing. Oh, don’t get me wrong, the teaching has its rewards, like when a kid visited me after the final bell rang […]

GOD SAVE JOHN PRINE: Please Lord, We Don’t Ask For Much (In Fact We’ve Never Asked For Anything)

EDITOR’S NOTE: John Prine passed away today of complications from Covid19. So we’re re-posting Jonathan Houlon’s tribute penned a week ago upon the news that Prine had contracted Covid19 and was in the ICU on a ventilator. Jesus Christ died for nothing, I suppose. Goddamn. BY JONATHAN HOULON If you haven’t heard, sad news from Nashville: John Prine, folksinger-songwriter extraordinaire and a goddamn national treasure, is on a ventilator with Covid-19 symptoms. If anyone can beat this thing, it’s Prine — he’s proven to be pretty much un-killable. He’s already stood up to cancer. Twice! One of his bouts and […]

DISPATCHES: My Life Under Quarantine

EDITOR’S NOTE: I’ve asked Phawker contributors to send in dispatches describing their lives under quarantine. Enjoy. BY DAN TABOR FILM CRITIC So, for my day job, I do IT. Luckily it’s something you can do from almost anywhere. I work for a successful local non-essential retailer whose home offices are based in Center City. Our stores may be closed for the time being, but retail life is all about planning ahead — since it can sometimes take 3 to 6 months to get a product in stores. So currently all of corporate is working from home, pulling normal 8 hour […]

OP-ED: The New Abnormal

EDITOR’S NOTE: Gonna be doing a weekly OpEd for Philly Mag until this shit show is over and I can go back to my day job. Whatever that is. Here’s the first one. PHILADELPHIA MAGAZINE: At a press conference back in 1986, President Ronald Reagan famously declared “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: ‘I’m from the government, and I’m here to help’” setting into motion the austere neoliberal in-free-markets-we-trust, get-a-job-you-bum zeitgeist that held sway for the next 34 years. That is until the COVID-19 pandemic finally breached the walls of fortress America and quickly metastasized into […]

DISPATCHES: My Life Under Quarantine

EDITOR’S NOTE: I’ve asked Phawker contributors to send in dispatches describing their lives under quarantine. Our first one is from our intern, who, like all of our interns, is a student at Temple. BY RACHEL TESON It started with cleaning. I went into work where I am a hostess, and they gave me a red bucket and gloves. Since the restaurant is a high volume one by City Hall, our bosses wanted to try to combat the spread by cleaning as much as possible. I had to wipe down the revolving door and the hostess stand every half hour, and […]