R.I.P. EDDIE VAN HALEN(1955-2020)
POOR LASLO, I HOPE HE’S ALIVE AND I HOPE HE’S HOLDING UP. (NOT AN UNUSUAL thought when you hit 50 and older about people you haven’t seen in decades. And I’m too adverse to Facebook…
NOT PREACHIN’ TO THE CHOIR, OR WHY TYLER CHILDERS’ PROTEST SONG IS SO DAMN POTENT
HOW IN THE HELL DOES A SELF-PROCLAIMED “WHITE BOY FROM HICKMAN”[Kentucky] create a better “Black Lives Matter” song in 2020 than anyone actually Black?!? How in the hell does an artist summon more moral courage…
Continue Reading NOT PREACHIN’ TO THE CHOIR, OR WHY TYLER CHILDERS’ PROTEST SONG IS SO DAMN POTENT
TWO SCI-FI TRAILERS: MORE SAND, MORE SENSATION
TWO SCI-FI TRAILERS RECENTLY CAUGHT MY EYE, ONE EXPECTED, THE OTHER NOT so much, yet it held my attention far longer than I expected. I haven’t been a science fiction buff since my boyhood. This…
Continue Reading TWO SCI-FI TRAILERS: MORE SAND, MORE SENSATION
R.I.P. DAME DIANA RIGG(1938-2020)
THE ABOVE MEME IS EXACTLY HOW I FEEL ABOUT DIANA RIGG. IF YOU ARE over 50 and of a certain sexual disposition the death of Diana Rigg might have sent you into a sadness at…
EVEN AFTER A HUNDRED YEARS CHARLIE “BIRD” PARKER STILL NEEDS AN INTRODUCTION
CHARLIE “YARDBIRD” PARKER STILL CAN’T CATCH A BREAK. WHAT SHOULD have been his glorious centennial year has been effectively capsized by the corona virus pandemic and the worst racial strife in America since the 1960s. …
Continue Reading EVEN AFTER A HUNDRED YEARS CHARLIE “BIRD” PARKER STILL NEEDS AN INTRODUCTION
MOTLEY CRUE THE DIRT: THE MEMOIR
FOR DECADES THE “GOLD STANDARD” FOR ROCK TELL-ALL BOOKS WAS Stephen Davis’s Hammer of the Gods: The Led Zeppelin Saga, perhaps followed by Jerry Hopkins and Danny Sugerman’s No One Here Gets Out Alive, the…
PETER GREEN’S FLEETWOOD MAC, MINE & HOPEFULLY YOURS: A TRIBUTE TO PETER GREEN(1946-2020)
Green.Peter. Lead guitarist in the original, blues-based, all-English lineup of Fleetwood Mac. Revered in his days as a virtuoso on the order of Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton, Green abruptly withdrew from the spotlight in…
WHO WOULDN’T WANT TO BE LIKE BRUCE LEE?!? AN APPRECIATION OF BE WATER(2020)
THERE’S A BRUCE LEE DOCUMENTARY FOR EVERY DECADE, WHICH REFLECTS THAT decade or the tenor of the times. In the late 70’s a few years after his death I remember some rather shoddy ones. Hastily…
Continue Reading WHO WOULDN’T WANT TO BE LIKE BRUCE LEE?!? AN APPRECIATION OF BE WATER(2020)
R.I.P. MORRICONE
ENNIO MORRICONE(1928-2020) FOR YOUR NAME TO BECOME AN ADJECTIVE OR ADVERB DURING THE COURSE of your lifetime can be a grand accomplishment. (I am deliberately ignoring anything related to social media or reality shows, because…
NEIL YOUNG “HOMEGROWN,” THE “LOST” ALBUM
BEWARE THE IDES OF MARCH–AND BEWARE THE HYPE OF THE “LOST” ALBUM. AS prolific an artist as Neil Young has been–averaging an album per year every year since 1969, he’s also known for aborting some…