Phawker

BY RICHARD SUPLEE GEEK SPACE CORRESPONDENT Shazam! is hands down DC’s best movie since The Dark Knight trilogy. Filmed in Toronto but set in Philly, Shazam! is an old fashioned feel good film that is perfect for a character first created in 1939 (under the name Captain Marvel, which is a story for another time). The film begins when Billy Batson (Asher Angel) arrives at a new foster home with five other children. He quickly hits the superpower lottery when a wizard grants him the powers of Shazam. By invoking the magic word SHAZAM! Billy Batson is transformed into a superhero (played by Chuck’s Zachery Levi). So Billy and his new foster brother Freddy Freeman (Jack Dylan Gazer) do what every teenage boy does would  do when they gain superpowers: stop a mugging, get shot in the face, and buy beer with Billy’s new powers and adult body. But don’t worry, Shazam quickly spits out the foul tasting liquid and buys soda and junk food like any other kid. And that is what makes this movie. Even as a superhero able to go toe to toe with Superman, Shazam is still, at heart, a kid. And that translates into a goofy montage of Shazam saving people around Philadelphia and shooting lightning from his fingertips at the top of the Art Museum steps for tips.

Yet the film is not just a comedy. The emo-narrative of Billy’s search for the mother he lost as a kid drives the film. It creates tension between the kid and his new foster family. And yet his new brothers and sisters help him locate his mother. And despite the rejection he faces from her, Billy does ultimately find his family. This point is driven home in the film’s climax, wherein all hope seems lost as Billy is outnumbered against Dr. Thaddeus Sivana (Mark Strong) and the 7 Deadly Sins. Until Billy does the same thing the wizard did for him and bestows Shazam-ish super power to his foster siblings (including Freddy Freeman and Mary Bromfield becoming the film versions  of the formerly-known-as DC heroes Captain Marvel Jr. and Mary Marvel). And seeing the entire Shazam family on the big screen was just pure awesomeness. It’s a scene of the golden age cheesy goodness like a page out of 1940s’ comics as six superheroes kick ass in the middle of a carnival. There is childlike glee on the heroes’ faces as they fly, throw lightning (while shouting hadoken), and catch a falling ferris wheel. And then they defeat the villains. Together. As a family.

This is a pretty devastating unmasking of Tucker Carlson’s fake populist pose and how he employs it to keep the peasants at each other’s throats instead of storming the palaces of the rich elites who oppress and exploit them. Well done Vox.

Photo by Dan Burn-Forti

EDITOR’S NOTE: This interview originally published on April 28th, 2012. To mark the auspicious occasion of Nick Lowe, backed by Los Straight Jackets, playing a SOLD OUT show at Ardmore Music Hall on Tuesday April 9th, we reprising it here. Enjoy.

BY ED KING ROCK EXPERT Nick Lowe’s nearly-half-century-long career as a singer-songwriter, record producer, and all-around musical instigator is a one-man Village Green Preservation Society, to quote the Kinks’ 1968 mission statement. After brief spell in a Cream-influenced psychedelic rock band, Kippington Lodge, Lowe and his fellow UK mates, including future standouts in the late-’70s new wave scene, got an early start on “preserving the old ways” in the Americana roots-rock band, Brinsley Schwarz. A big push to launch the band in the States flamed spectacularly, and in the US their records would be left for music nerds to dig out of the far reaches of used record bins for the next decade.

In 1976, following the demise of the Brinsleys, he hooked up with veteran Welsh musician and producer Dave Edmunds and carved out a role for himself “protecting the new ways,” as house producer for fledgling punk/new wave label Stiff Records. His “So It Goes” b/w “Heart of the City” was the first single on Stiff, and it heralded the artist’s devil-may-care approach to writing subversive takes on AM Top 40 hits of the ‘60s and early ‘70s. His solo output at this time peaked with his second album, Labour of Lust, on which he was backed by Edmunds and fellow members of Rockpile. The single from that album, “Cruel to Be Kind,” with the shaggy video including scenes from his wedding to Carlene Carter, is the most vibrant expression of the new wave era’s cheerful sense of fatalism. He must have been a good fit for the June Carter-Johnny Cash clan.

As a producer, Lowe made his mark helping Elvis Costello & The Attractions craft a diverse, high-octane run of five straight albums in five years, including their unexpectedly sincere take on one of Lowe’s Brinsley Schwarz-era hippie goofs, “(What’s So Funny ‘Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding.” Known as “The Basher,” for his no-nonsense approach to both work and play, Lowe wasn’t messing around, although frequently it just seemed that way. By the mid-’80s, despite a few minor hits and continued successful production work, Lowe was losing his way. His records lost their snap. The jokes were growing stale. The snappiest of that run, 1990’s aptly named Party Of One, was nevertheless the end of the line for Nick the Knife.
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VICE: Last week, Focus Features announced that director Jim Jarmusch’s truly bonkers zombie movie, The Dead Don’t Die, is dropping this summer, and that it’ll star just about every extremely cool person you’ve ever heard of. Now, just a few days later, the film’s first trailer is here—and good lord, this one is going to be an incredible, star-studded bloodbath. Are you ready to watch the reanimated corpse of Iggy Pop feast on the flesh of some unsuspecting mortals? Or Bill Murray unload a shotgun into a crowd of the undead? Or Adam Driver go to town with a machete? Or Tilda Swinton… Wait, is that a samurai sword? Is she going to—oh, fuck. Yeah, she is. MORE

RELATED: Q&A With Eszter Balint, Star Of Jim Jarmusch’s Stranger Than Paradise

BY WILLIAM C. HENRY I promised you a rant regarding Trump’s raging against the horrors of Democrat SOCIALISM and vowing he will NEVER allow America to become a SOCIALIST country. So, here it is: According to one Donald J. Trump, president of the United States of America, the Democrat party is dead set on forcing wholesale SOCIALISM down the country’s collective throat beginning in 2020, and he is the only politician alive who can prevent them from doing so. Oh my, all I can say is thank God we’ve got someone sufficiently au fait with the nation’s past 85 year history as to be capable of recognizing such Democrat nefariousness, and who, coincidentally, also possesses the requisite strength of moral and patriotic character/fervor to right the ship of state in the very nick of time! Uh, wait a minute …

MEDICARE/MEDICAID: You do know that the medical and mental health services provided through this GOVERNMENT agency are paid for by a “single payer,” namely the GOVERNMENT, right? Nearly ALL Americans pay money IN through GOVERNMENT-ENFORCED wage and salary deductions so that the GOVERNMENT can in turn pay funds OUT to cover the costs of healthcare for them in their later years. Sounds a wee bit SOCIALISTIC to me. Do you intend to abolish it? Doing so could become a bit contentious, no? You are familiar with Medicare, aren’t you? Sorry. I promise to assume nothing where you’re concerned from this point on.

THE VETERANS ADMINISTRATION: Just between you and me, it’s ENTIRELY paid for by the GOVERNMENT. It provides for the medical and mental health needs of the nation’s veterans. ALL of V.A.’s services are made available at NO CHARGE to any and all veterans. If that sounds SOCIALISTIC to you, Mr. president, it’s because IT IS! 100%. Beneficiaries don’t pay in, solely the GOVERNMENT pays out. Trust me, Donnie, if it looks like SOCIALISM, swims like SOCIALISM, and quacks like SOCIALISM, you can be damn near certain that’s EXACTLY what it is?! I guess you’re definitely gonna have to do away with this one … and quickly! Good luck splainin’ why.

SOCIAL SECURITY: It’s a stipend paid out by the GOVERNMENT to a LOT of folks over 62, and nearly EVERY American citizen over 65. It’s an entirely SOCIALISTIC security net that just about EVERY working American pays into, and primarily the senior portion draw out of to help cover cost-of-living expenses in their elder years. You have heard of it haven’t you, Mr. president? Well, maybe not. I guess I was thinking you might have read about it. On the other hand, I’m pretty sure it’s been splashed all over Fox News. Anyhoo, Shirley you plan to axe it, right?

THE FARM BILL:  A.K.A.SOCIALISTIC GOVERNMENT SUBSIDIES that the Department of Agriculture pays out annually to the richest American farmers. Are you going to plow those under as well? You might want to “cultivate” some of those farm state political contributors before spraying any of that anti-SOCIALISM pest and weed killer of yours on their corn and soybean fields. Just sayin’. Heh, heh.

UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE: It’s been described as an altogether SOCIALISTIC sort of program that employers are compelled to pay into so that their workers will at least be able to put food on the table during lay-offs, shut-downs, etc.. Been around for quite a while. No doubt, you’re going to want to “fire” this one for sure.

Then there’s the military. And the Post Office. And FEMA. Food stamps. Pell Grants for student loans. And on and on, it just gets more socialist-y the further down the government ladder you go — the fire department, the police department, the water works, streets department, parks and rec and last but not least, that towering monument to Socialism: the public library. It must be blowing yer frickin’ Adderall-addled mind to finally realize that all these beloved institutions and staples of American life were Socialism the whole time! I know that at times you get a little confused between the meanings of “collusion” and “delusion,” but in the particular case of your resolute stand against Democrat SOCIALISM–and for the true sake of your political survival (believe me, even your “base” is likely to bail on this one)–it’s the latter I think you need to spend a little more time deciphering. By the way, Mexico is still gonna pay for the wall, right? Just checkin’.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Fed up later stage septuagenarian who has actually been most of there and done most of that. Born and raised in the picturesque Pocono Mountains. Quite well educated. Very lucky to have been born into a well-schooled and somewhat prosperous family. Long divorced. One beautiful, brilliant daughter. Two far above average grandsons. Semi-retired (how does anyone manage to do it completely these days?) and fully-tired of bullshit. Uncle of the Editor-In-Chief.

Photo by JOSH PELTA-HELLER

David Portner – a.k.a. Avey Tare – is best known for being one of the founding members of freak folk/noise rock/experimental pop outfit Animal Collective. He met his Animal brethren in high school, and has since laid down some of the most otherworldly recordings this side of the Milky Way – although, to be honest, I have my suspicions that they may have come from someplace much farther out. And while his music takes on such extraterrestrial qualities in both his contributions to Animal Collective and in his eponymous solo project, his diverse instrumentation and melodies have at the same time always been earthy and organic. This dichotomy is part of what fascinates me about Avey Tare’s sound, and I think it’s why people fall in love with Animal Collective. In recent years, the band’s sound has lost that earthiness as they’ve consistently delved deeper into experimental electronic bubblegum. As a long-time Animal Collective fan, I’ve found that Avey Tare’s sound is closer to classic AnCo than the full band is in its current creative state. And for that reason, I implore any nostalgic fans to go see Avey Tare on his current U.S. tour.

In support of his latest album, Cows on Hourglass Pond, released on March 22nd, Avey Tare is on tour as a trio, as opposed to his usual solo gig. Joining him are fellow Animal, Deakin (guitar, keys, bass), and Jeremy Hyman (drums) of the art rock group, Ponytail. The three come together to put on a powerful live performance – especially owing to the musical simpatico between Avey Tare and Deakin. I caught them on Saturday at the intimate PhilaMOCA.

A beautiful solo performance by opening act Nathan Bowles, on banjo and occasional vocals, gently eased the audience’s ears into listening mode. He didn’t sing much, but nobody would’ve complained if he had – the man’s got pipes. I would call his musical style Eastern-influenced Americana. It’s folky, it’s meditative. Good stuff.

But then Avey Tare came on.

It was like being whisked into another world. I watched from the balcony as the trio psychedelically eased into the set, which was mostly songs off of the new record. I distinctly recall the cracking open of beer cans respectfully between songs – and there was a lot of it, as PhilaMOCA’s a BYOB joint packed with Pabst-slinging hipsters. I’m more of a Yuengling guy myself, but I opted to stick with water for the evening.

As the show went on, and as the songs got groovier, more and more of the once-stiff crowd succumbed to modest dancing-in-place. I, for one, couldn’t help myself. Cows has some really danceable tunes, like the jazzy “Eyes on Eyes” and the bouncy “Saturdays (Again),” both of which were even better live than they are on the album – and that’s saying something. I hate to say this, but I just haven’t been satisfied with the last few AnCo albums; Avey Tare, though, has done justice to their legacy with the music he keeps making, and seeing him play his own material live with Deakin only strengthened the AnCo vibes of the show. The two were interwoven in their musicianship as they traded instruments multiple times – Avey Tare on bass at one point, with Deakin on guitar, as well as both playing each other’s guitar. I hear that Avey Tare’s vocals are often hit or miss in live settings, which is understandable considering his strenuous, experimental vocal style, but I assure you: this time, it was a hit.

Saturday having been the warmest day of the year in Philly so far, the air-conditioning-less PhilaMOCA reached sweltering conditions, and toward the end of the show, the room was almost as hot as a Swans concert. After notifying the audience that he only had a couple songs left – stressing “just a couple” – Avey Tare added, “It’s a hot room.” I’m glad it wasn’t just my poor choice of taking a balcony position, but I hope it won’t stop AT from coming back. – KYLE WEINSTEIN

Photo by STEVE GARFINKEL

I am old enough to remember when Bon Iver was just a weird-beard folkie lumberjack with a broken heart and a bad liver haunting the woods of Wisconsin, cranking out subterranean heartsick blues in his dad’s hunting cabin like the Unabomber of Love. This was back before he went prog-rock at Newport and started a riot. It was way cray. I remember Father John Misty threatening to cut the power with an axe and the guys from Mumford & Sons had to wrestle him to the ground. Despite the confusion of the moment, when the smoke finally cleared it was obvious that the times they were a-changin’.

The disconnect from the naked light bulb starkness of 2008’s For Emma, Forever Ago to the dense, 17-layer prog cake of 2011’s Bon Iver, Bon Iver was jarring — like going from Wednesday Morning, 3 AM to Lamb Lies Down On Broadway by way of TV On The Radio. Mostly, I blame Kanye, who lured him to his studio compound in Hawaii to give 2010’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy some of that Barton Fink Feeling Vernon has in spades. But as the days turned into weeks, it turned into one of those Hotel California situations where you can check out any time you like but you can never leave. Bon Iver music was never the same after that.

Judging by the ecstatic crowd that packed out the Tower back in 2011 for the tour in support of Bon Iver Bon Iver, I was the sole naysayer. He doubled down on 2016’s 22, A Million, an album that is, like Kanye, either crazy-level genius or genius-level crazy depending on the day, and the multitudes that flocked to his concerts grew into a cult of the deeply devoted. Three years after releasing an album, he is able to pack out The Met for a two night run that ended last night.

The live band is a tight five piece — two drummers, two guitarists (counting Vernon) and a bassist — capable of rendering the densely idiosyncratic sonics of the last two albums with razor-sharp precision and note-perfect fidelity complimented by a magnificently choreographed light show and the Met’s perfect sound forever. They look less like a band than starship technicians manning their work stations within the elaborate H.R. Giger-esque Rube Goldberg contraption that is the stage set.

Vernon, rocking a head band and big, blocky old school earphones, is still in full possession of the most heartbreakingly beautiful falsetto to emanate from a hairy guy in blue jeans and flannel since Neil Young woke up in a burned-out building with a full moon in his eyes. That is, when he’s not atomizing his dulcet tone into bewildering fractals of sound with a Auto-Tune and sundry alchemical sonic gadgetry.

It was, all told, a transcendental performance. And live, the newer material has a chest-thumping physicality and sweaty friction that is somewhat muted on the albums, despite the crystalline clarity of the recordings. But while I’m happy to join Bon Iver’s cult for a night or two, I’m sorry to say I don’t think I will ever love what Bon Iver has become the way Justin Vernon loved Emma, like, forever ago. – JONATHAN VALANIA

From Act Surprised, their first album in six years, out May 24th. They play Underground Arts on July 24th.

MISSING PIECE: Act Surprised continues the soulful collaboration that’s defined the band since 1991’s Sebadoh III and 1994’s Bakesale. The new batch of songs reaffirms how vital the creative partnership is between members Lou Barlow, Jason Loewenstein, and Bob D’Amico. When Barlow recently moved back to his home state of Massachusetts following a series of personal changes, he pressed the restart button and, in time, felt the incentive to reach out to Jason and Bob again to reunite and start work on a new album. The trio convened and began recording in their original stomping grounds in western Massachusetts where they first formed back in 1988. Along with producer/sound engineer Justin Pizzoferrato, Sebadoh have delivered one of the best records of their career. Act Surprised is a 15-song collection that’s as dynamic and visceral as anything the band has ever committed to tape. Loewenstein stated, “Of all the records we have made in our long career, this is definitely the most recent.” MORE

PREVIOUSLY: NATURAL ONE: Q&A With Lo-Fi Troubadour Lou Barlow Of Dino Jr./Sebadoh/Folk Implosion Fame

FRESH AIR: After working for five years as a writer and producer on Saturday Night Live, comic John Mulaney thought he knew everything there was to know about the show. “I was like a busboy,” Mulaney says of his SNL tenure. “I was like, ‘I know all the secrets, and I know all the ins and outs, and I know how to sneak out of the kitchen and I know where we get the meat delivered from.’ ” Though Mulaney left SNL in 2012 to pursue other comedic projects, he returned in 2018 and again in 2019 — this time as show host. That’s when he learned that stepping in front of the camera at SNL is a whole different experience from working behind the scenes. “I was absolutely terrified,” Mulaney says. “To be performing something you’ve written and trying to listen to the jokes while making sure you’re on your mark and looking into the right camera and then being pulled around to do costume fittings — it was scary.” Mulaney had previously written for SNL cast members Andy Samberg, Fred Armisen and Bill Hader — and he called them with a confession: “I said, ‘I just want you to know, I never said this before, but I always thought we [writers] had the harder job, and I’m so sorry. I had no idea how hard this was.’ ” Mulaney is an actor, with Nick Kroll, on Big Mouth, an animated Netflix series about adolescence and puberty. He recently completed a comedy tour with SNL cast member Pete Davidson. In 2018, he won an Emmy for writing for his comedy special Kid Gorgeous, which was recorded live at Radio City Music Hall. MORE

BY WILLIAM C. HENRY This just in: Betsy DeVos, in what is arguably the most unconscionable and cartoonishly evil proposed budget cut from this satanic administration, wants to cut the 18 MILLION dollar$ from her Department of Education budget earmarked for the 2020 Special Olympics. As Betsy so DeVosly stated it: “We had to make some difficult decisions.” She goes on to say that funding for the Special Olympics should come from private philanthropy. Capital idea! If DeVos sold just ONE of her 10 yachts — or if Trump personally covered the cost of just SIX of his golf+unlimited buffet trips to Mar-A-Lago instead of handing the bill to the American taxpayer — it would more than cover the $18 million in Special Olympics funding they want to slash.  And this is just a warm up, folks.

Let’s get something straight right up front: When speaking about the portion of Trump’s 2020 budget proposal to be allotted for “defense,” we’re really talking about the funds he’s requesting to maintain and expand America’s “firepower.” Euphemisms in Washington are as easy to come by as ass covers. Anyway, whichever way you spin it, it’s an obscene $720 BILLION+ that Trump proposes to spend on military salaries, weaponry, bombs, missiles, ships, planes and 800+ bases around the world (in contrast, France, Great Britain and Russia COMBINED maintain about 30). And, if that hasn’t totally floated your boat, keep in mind that that figure does NOT include the 10s of billion$ in HIDDEN funds that are annually set aside and secretly consumed by such entities as the CIA and NSA (and at least 15 other federal intelligence agencies most of which you’ve probably never even heard of) all of which means, comparatively speaking, that Trump wants to spend about 3 TIMES as much as China does on its military, and about 10 TIMES as much as Russia does or, to be more precise, about as much as the next 13 countries COMBINED do on THEIR firepower! So, with all of this in mind, I thought I might take the opportunity to highlight just how fatally–and factually–this heinous absurdity will affect real “life and death” matters in America, you know, real matters–not Trump’s interminably fake crap–that actually do matter to the lives and DEATHS of so many ordinary, everyday Americans like you and me:
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Bon Iver plays The Met tonight and tomorrow night.

FRESH AIR: On March 15, a 28-year-old Australian man opened fire in two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, killing 50 people and injuring dozens more. The shooter had previously declared allegiance to “white identity” — a fact that came as no surprise to J.M. Berger, an author who studies extremist movements. “We’re seeing a resurgence in various countries,” he says of white nationalism. “It’s a worldwide phenomenon.” Berger, who studies the online activity of extremists, notes that the New Zealand shooter praised President Trump as “as a symbol of renewed white identity” in a 74-page document he published before the massacre. That mention, Berger says, aligns with a trend he found when he studied the hashtags and language used by alt-right Twitter users. “When we do the social media analysis, it comes shouting out at you,” he says. “We can count the links that they put out on Twitter and other social media platforms, and what we find is the most common is ‘#MAGA.’ The most common description of somebody that they use in the profile, they use on Twitter, is ‘Trump supporter.'” MORE

RELATED: Today, authoritarianism has emerged as the greatest challenge facing the liberal democratic world — a profound ideological, as well as strategic, challenge. Or, more accurately, it has reemerged, for authoritarianism has always posed the most potent and enduring challenge to liberalism, since the birth of the liberal idea itself. Authoritarianism has now returned as a geopolitical force, with strong nations such as China and Russia championing anti-liberalism as an alternative to a teetering liberal hegemony. It has returned as an ideological force, offering the age-old critique of liberalism, and just at the moment when the liberal world is suffering its greatest crisis of confidence since the 1930s. It has returned armed with new and hitherto unimaginable tools of social control and disruption that are shoring up authoritarian rule at home, spreading it abroad and reaching into the very heart of liberal societies to undermine them from within.

An 1876 engraving of a John Trumbull painting depicts the signing of the Declaration of Independence in 1776. The Founders based the document on the philosophy that all humans were endowed with “natural rights.” (W.L. Ormsby via the Associated Press) We in the liberal world have yet to comprehend the magnitude and coherence of the challenge. We do not know how to manage the new technologies that put liberalism at a disadvantage in the struggle. Many of us do not care to wage the struggle at all. Some find the authoritarian critique of liberalism compelling; others value liberalism too little to care if the world order that has sustained it survives. In this new battle of ideas, we are disarmed, perhaps above all because we have forgotten what is at stake. MORE

Photo by JOSH PELTA-HELLER

“I should start by saying that I’ve opened for a lot of bands on this stage before, so to be the main act here tonight is just – it’s really wild,” were the first words out of Lucy Dacus’s mouth last night at Union Transfer. Taking shelter from the pouring rain, a near sold-out crowd of hipsters just old enough to understand some of the darkness embedded in Dacus’ lyrics gathered to witness her energy firsthand in what was the penultimate stop of her recent tour.

Though her latest record Historian came out a little over a year ago now, Dacus earned even more reverence from the indie rock world for her collaboration with Phoebe Bridgers and Matador labelmate Julien Baker to form the supergroup trio boygenius last fall. Their self-titled EP was a testament to the way that the work of these female musicians could simultaneously fuse together and stand alone (a dynamic quality critics typically reserve for the male “geniuses” of the world). Though some of the songs on that EP are quiet and emotional, there is an undercurrent of unsettled distortion that has its source in Dacus, and she brought that emotional dissonance to Philadelphia last night.

Setting down a tall cup of tea, Dacus looked warmly out at the crowd before beginning the set with a poignant as-yet-unrecorded solo song that some fans listed as “Fool’s Gold” in her recent online setlists. She brought the band onstage to follow it with a string of songs from Historian including “Addictions,” “The Shell,” and “Nonbelievers,” pausing only once between tunes to say — endearingly I might add — “I forget if I said this, but my name is Lucy Dacus.” Before progressing into the bouncing bass and folksy echoed vocals of “Yours & Mine,” she paused to give a brief explanation of the lyrics behind the deceivingly happy rhythms. Despite the encircling comfort implied by the line “Take care of you and yours,” she told the crowd that her words have more to do with the feeling of being from a place like America at this time, and the tension that comes from not always being proud of that. Zeroing in on her hometown of Richmond, Virginia, as an example, she spoke fondly of the town, saying that she loved it but that “when you love something that means you can tell what sucks the most about it.” Her solution to all of this? “Maintain hope.”
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