It’s Lionel Goldbart on the phone, dissing me. “Oh, no, I know what this means. We’re going to have to read over and over about how this is the last ‘Program Notes’ forever blah blah.” Of course, the truth is, this is the last ‘Program Notes’ ever. If you don’t…
The rumblings of a revolution can be felt in the music industry air. The record companies are testing the waters of technology, though you’ll probably never hear about it, much less actually hear it. What they’re trying to do is move us print-press dinosaurs into the modern age by linking…
Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wills Wilde was a man who loved other men. It was perhaps this aspect of his life that inspired him to write, nearly 100 years ago, that “the only sin is stupidity.” He also wrote “It is through art, and through art only, that we can realize…
Clarity is the clarion call of great journalism. Okay, so clarion pretty much means clarity, but there’s also the “shrill” part of the definition. It was cool last week that Max Borges, who brought the South Florida Rock Awards to, duh, South Florida, and is a very smart man, calls…
For some strange reason (the media), Margie Adam, the purest pop singer this side of Judy Collins, seems to be better known for the several years she spent not making music. A decade ago, Adam quit the music biz at the apex of her career. Now she’s back. And there…
Ted Nugent has problems. He might be the happiest rock and roll animal in the jungle, but sometimes you wonder if he’s just one synapse away from Koreshville. Believe him A if Janet Reno and the government ever send the badged boys out to his place, they’re going to get…
The transformation is complete, I am you, you am I, and boy is it confusing. When you went to Rose’s Bar on South Beach recently to see For Squirrels and the new lineup of Natural Causes, you weren’t sure whether to laugh, cry, or jack somebody’s ass. You had more…
It was one of those silly moments in musical history, a throwaway novelty song performed by a duo of comedians. It was a joke, son. And yet a few of us still get the shivers just thinking about it. For some of us it wasn’t just a goofy spoof, it…
Frank “Rat Bastard” Falestra came out to watch our basketball team (formerly known as “New Times” but dubbed “Foghat” this season) play the other night. After the game my wife spotted the Ratboy, and I told her he was our new coach. Rat: “If I was your coach, I would’ve…
We’re getting real close. Thanks to everyone for not leaving me alone. I need your cards and letters and phone calls and internal memos. I respect Johnny Punk Rock Potash much more than I’d ever (or ever will) respect Kurt Cobain (he’s dead), not just for living on but for…
“It’s impossible to be a competent popular music critic,” writes Dave Marsh, generally considered one of the top rock journalists in the land. So Dave, why don’t you get a real job? That’s the problem, Marsh argues in the March issue of Rock & Rap Confidential: Being a competent crit…
This week I’d like to explain the meaning of life. Someday I’ll explain the meaning of this column. No, wait. I already did that. Life is about being young, being old, being rock and roll. It is, Sartre might say, the absence of death, but then again, he’s dead. And…
Out where people actually work for a living, the saying goes like this: Let’s done get the job did. Or, past tense: We done got the job did. The rest of us just get lucky sometimes, get by. I’m about ten hours from deadline and I have no idea what…
Of all the people gadding about in the fire-hot sun baking the steps of the Dade County Courthouse, this guy is the most easily pegged as a narc. The others gathering around the display tables are a mix of Pearl Jam concert refugees, hippie-heyday leftovers, old ladies. Aside from those…
In the early weeks of the fall semester a ceremony unfolded within the University Center complex at UM’s campus in Coral Gables. Upstairs in the Flamingo Ballroom the media circled like vultures, determined to capture this monumental moment: a celebration of the boost in power of WVUM’s signal. On hand…
Remember that old Silos lyric that went “people will talk about/What’s important to them”? Thanks for all your calls and letters. Don’t stop now. The great Art Grace (Thoroughbred writer, edge-music connoisseur, legend) wrote to recommend Lucy’s Fur Coat, for both the music and the cover photo on Jaundice. “The…
I’ll take your words even if you won’t tell me your name: “This is a crass and insensitive article I just read in New Times about Kurt Cobain. There’s no place for writing something like that. You don’t like the guy’s music, that’s fine. You’ve got to glorify that a…
If, like his mother said, Kurt Cobain wanted to to join the “club” whose members include Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, and other dead rock stars, at least he should have stuck around long enough to make a couple of decent albums. Pardon me if I’m less than impressed…
I’m pretty sure Kurt Cobain never got to see the Chant live, but Charlie Van Tuggle did. The Chant was my favorite band when they were a South Florida band, when they were a band. This was one of the annual homecoming shows, after the members had moved to Atlanta…
Well, let’s see. We’ve tried massive drug abuse. Profane violence. Riding the bus. Animal photos. Baby photos. Baby animal photos. Tried to start fights with people who couldn’t care less, which is why we tried to start fights with them. I spend hours some people don’t even know exist A…
Elvis Costello sang about it. Not that he’s any expert. But hearing the sloppy guitar tangle, the talkin’-to-God vocal intro, the drum blast, and those words spilled out, a mental image grows: “There’s a girl in this address/There’s always a girl in distress/She’s just a shabby doll…she’s just a shabby…
Ted Hawkins The Next Hundred Years (DGC) Every so often you hear a performer for the first time and the experience actually changes you. Such epiphanies are usually delivered by someone with an intensely personal vision, one that penetrates directly to your core, cuts you open and crawls inside there…
