IT'S not often that a theater performance stops me cold. But last week's Rodney King, a one-man-show by Roger Guenveur Smith at the Bootleg Theater left me both impressed and a little shaken up at the very least.When I moved to LA in 1997, the city seemed like a sunny, youthful, high-spirited place after a few years in New England. But underneath the good times, there was a sense that I was living … [Read more...]
Nostalgia, The Oscars and "The Artist"
LAST night's Academy Awards confirmed expectations that movies pining for the art of the past (the French past, in some cases) would walk away with the most trophies. The big winner, of course, was The Artist, which snagged best actor for Jean Dujardin, best director for Michel Hazanavicius and best picture.Scorsese's Hugo, set in a Paris train station in the '30s and with a backstory involving … [Read more...]
Simon Reynolds Goes Retro
HAS the end of cultural history ever been so much fun? Your humble scribe has been reading Simon Reynolds since his work was a well-kept secret of the British music press. (He was also, during the ‘90s, one of two rock-crit Simons in the Village Voice, the other being the code-cracking rock sociologist Simon Frith.)He’s written with insight and intelligence about rock n roll, subculture, shoegaze, … [Read more...]
Happy Birthday Junot Diaz (and Happy New Year to You)
TODAY is, by most accounts, the end of a decade -- and a mostly bad one at that. But it gives us here at the Misread City some pleasure to nod to a writer of the oughts who we're hoping will be an even bigger figure in the 2010s. Today is the 41st birthday of Junot Diaz, author of the story collection "Drown" and the Pulitzer winning novel "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao."I spoke to Diaz … [Read more...]
Congratulating Spoon — Alas
FIRST of all, I'm awfully pleased that one of my favorite working bands -- the Austin/ Portland combo Spoon -- has been voted the decade's best indie rock band, American division, by the readers of The Misread City. More proof that my Steve McQueen/ '59 Miles Davis/ Audrey Hepburn- digging followers have great taste. (And an incredibly retro sensibility, but maybe that is my fault.)For this … [Read more...]