Different Kind of Lucky
I vowed to finish and post “Different Kind of Lucky” a couple of weeks ago but if you’ve been reading this blog you know that despite my best intentions a few things have gotten in the way. Well, one...
View ArticleJuliana Hatfield Says Goodbye To The Stage, Hello To Art School
Here’s a conundrum: what do you do when the thing you love makes you sick? Juliana Hatfield has been trying to answer that question for a long time. In 2008 she put out a hopefully-titled album, How To...
View ArticleListening Lab: Thurston Moore
Maybe everything exists at once: past and present, youth and adulthood, consonance and dissonance, secrets and confessions, punk and art. Thurston Moore makes me believe it.
View ArticleThe Death of Cool
I had lunch last week with a friend of mine who’s in the music business. He’s a passionate guy, around my age, with an impressive resume. I like talking to him. We debated the fine points of the Black...
View ArticleAs Her Mother Descends Into Dementia, Jonatha Brooke Puts Her Career On Hold.
Jonatha Brooke is a singer, a songwriter, and a caretaker. For the past couple of years her music career has taken a backseat to caring for her mother, a poet who is in the final stages of Alzheimer’s...
View ArticleListening Lab: St. Vincent
Everything about writing “My Cake” has been hard and thrilling. I’ve got a melody now, thanks to Gary, who pointed me to “Actor Out Of Work.” The song had fallen off my radar, as songs will do. If...
View ArticleMike Doughty Is Looking Back and Moving On. Neat Trick.
And the award for Rock Musician Least Likely to Become a Nostalgia Act goes to…Mike Doughty. The former Soul Coughing frontman doesn’t play Soul Coughing songs. Ever. His new memoir, “The Book of...
View ArticleMy Cake Is Something. Not A Song. But Something.
To recap: a drum machine, a keyboard, and a wannabe songwriter walk into a bar. “What’ll it be?” “The usual. Confusion. Frustration. Elation. Disappointment. Fear.” “How about a shot of selfishness?...
View ArticleVicarious Is A Four-Letter Word.
I just finished reading Stone Arabia by Dana Spiotta. The book is about a 40-something former rock ‘n roll wunderkind, Nik, a recluse who keeps making brilliant music, and his sister, Denise. It’s...
View ArticleListening Lab: EMA
I’m writing a moody rock song about the mall. It’s pretty dark and sort of pretty and there isn’t much of a rhyme scheme but I’m enjoying the literalness of it. I like a lyric that looks you in the...
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