Music
Going ‘Through the Years’ with Casey Kasem and an imaginary ‘Weekly Top Million’
Dear Casey, You were the voice of music for me as a kid. Not literally: You didn’t sing, you didn’t play an instrument. But in my preadolescent days, there wasn’t a single Sunday that went by where I wasn’t glued to the radio for the four hours it took you to work through the Billboard…
Read MoreKaty Perry is not an anti-Semite. Probably.
I don't wander out in the world looking to get offended. If you go out looking for a fight, a fight will find you. But sometimes you don't have to look. That said, I have to ask: Katy Perry, really? For those who may not know, Katy Perry has a video coming out Thursday in…
Read MoreWherein Bradley Cooper has a question for Sean Penn
Life rarely melds together this neatly; if there wasn't video/audio proof of this Louis C.K/Bradley Cooper/Sean Penn connection, I'd have to think the following video was a hoax. But it goes to prove that you never know where life is taking you next, that one day the handsome nobody in the front row asking…
Read MoreLife lessons in song, courtesy “American Idol” and Peter Cetera
"American Idol" is back on again, and it really is oh, so easy to look at those people and say: "Shit, I could do that." And though there's less meanness and crappy singers on than in the Simon Cowell years, it's even easier to say, "Those people are morons. Can't they hear themselves?" Answers: No,…
Read MoreWhy ‘American Idol’ has nothing to fear from me
Singing has a checkered past with me. I love singing, I love music, but put me in front of people to do it and things haven't always gone so well. (As a kid I was at a summer camp where we were all asked to perform in a pseudo talent show; I thought I could…
Read MoreOn Stone Roses and other teachers: Yeah, I’m talkin’ to you
Having done this journalism thing since high school — and now for over 25 years beyond — it's probably safe to say I've done thousands of interviews. In the recent vast cleaning out prior to a move I finally dumped most of the old ones, recorded on 90 and 120-minute cassette tapes, into the bin,…
Read MoreNew religion
Skipped SXSW, the film/interactive/music extravaganza nuttiness in Austin, TX this year. Didn't miss it. Even more strangely, I didn't blink much when I learned that The Band of My Youth would be headlining a show at Stubb's, one of the best rib joints in the city, and home to big acts during the madness (including…
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