Eric Volz' Gringo Nightmare
There’s a book out today I heartily recommend. In 2006 the American Eric Volz was living in Nicaragua and was falsely accused of brutally murdering his ex-girlfriend Doris Jimenez. At the time, I was consulting on Eric’s exciting new bi-lingual magazine project, El Puente (The Bridge). Eric had become a young leader in Nicaragua, even attracting the warm attention of high-ranking government officials for the good work he was doing in the country.... read more
2010 Oscars Live Blog
As promised in Friday’s Oscar takeover, we’re live blogging the Oscars again. Let’s see how our picks and predictions for this year’s awards hold up.... read more
Live Review and Video: Thom Yorke Secret Show - The Echoplex - Los Angeles, CA - 10/2/09
The familiar first notes of Thom Yorke’s title track from his solo album, Eraser, swept over a hazy crowd of lucky and excited ticket holders Friday night in Los Angeles. Yorke and the members of his new and currently unnamed L.A.-based group (including Flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers) took their places on The Echoplex stage, and officially began the show they called their “rehearsal.” And if the rehearsal is any indication of the group’s sound, Radiohead fans and music lovers alike can count on a certain eccentricity in balance with lovely, inspired music. ... read more
Glory Days: Dispatches From an Academic Conference on Bruce Springsteen (Part 4)
Saturday afternoon’s events at Glory Days included a panel event titled "Springsteen and Social Consciousness." It included Jen Chapin, former board chair of World Hunger Year, a songwriter and daughter of WHY founder Harry Chapin; Kathleen DiChiarra, president and CEO of Community Food Bank of New Jersey; Joe D’Urso, board member of WHY and the Light of Day Foundation; and Bob Benjamin, founder of the Light of Day concert series to benefit Parkinson’s research, reinforced just how deep Bruce’s commitment to social justice is on a community level. ... read more
Glory Days: Dispatches From an Academic Conference on Bruce Springsteen (Part 3)
The thing about attending conferences when such a diversity of smart people are speaking is choosing which sessions to go to. It works like this: First, you have your general sessions which everyone attends and are usually led by a high-profile participant or guest. Then, you disperse into these breakout sessions based on predetermined rubrics (which is really just a fancypants college word for "themes"). Which means there is a great cross-section of people saying interesting things from a variety of experiences, but you miss 90 percent of it. It’s an embarrassment of riches. ... read more
Glory Days: Dispatches From an Academic Conference on Bruce Springsteen (Part 2)
I took a walk late Friday night along the boardwalk in Asbury Park. It’s been almost seven years since I was last here, and things have certainly changed. Most of the Glory Days conference attendees, at least the ones who can still stay up this late, were listening to Gary U.S. Bonds at the Stone Pony.... read more
Glory Days: Dispatches From an Academic Conference on Bruce Springsteen (Part 1)
Anyone remember the first year of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductions? I think it was 1986. Pete Townsend noticed all the tuxedos everyone was wearing. “I see that rock and roll has become respectable…what a bummer!” ... read more
The Boys are Back in Town: Goodie Mob's Reunion Show
Back before Cee-Lo graced the cover of this very magazine, way before he drove us "Crazy", there was Goodie Mob (the Good Die Mostly Over Bullshit)... read more
Sing it in the Morning: A 10-Year-Old's Goodbye to Mary Travers
Mary Travers of the legendary folk trio Peter, Paul & Mary died Wednesday night at the age of 72.For my 10th birthday, my dad bought me a teal plastic cassette tape box and put two new cassettes in it: The Beach Boys' Endless Summer and Peter, Paul & Mary's Ten Years Together. The next year, I'd add a third album to the collection—Hootie & the Blowfish's Cracked Rear View, what a classic!—but for a while, those first two comprised the entirety of my record collection. Dreamy 60s pop and protest songs. I promptly decorated the case with Lisa Frank kitten... read more
Trailer Stash: Shutter Island, The Time Traveler's Wife, Inglourious Basterds, More
And now, a look at some of the notable trailers lighting up the internet: ... read more
My Encounter with Anvil! The Story of Anvil
It didn't feel like a choice. I bought the CD after the movie was over, and listened to it on the way home. It was impossible not to. The guy had almost begged us to buy it—said he needed the money to help pay his sister back, because she financed the album. It was their thirteenth record. The guys from Anvil had been making music and recording songs without success since almost before I was born. ... read more
Plunk, Plunk, Plunk: Grizzly Bear Sounds Like M.I.A. Sounds Like Lauryn Hill?
So, Grizzly Bear has a new album, Veckatimest, and people are freaking out about it almost as much as they'd freak out about, like, an actual grizzly bear. We just heard it clocked in at #8 on the Billboard chart for its first week of sales, 40% of which came from the Internet. Paste's own Matt Fink called it "a masterpiece" in his review last week. By all means, it's shaping up to be one of the biggest albums of the year—although when it comes time for the Paste staff to duke it out for our Best of 2009 list,... read more
Trailer Stash: New Moon, The Hangover, Toy Story 3, More
And now, a look at some notable trailers lighting up blogs and message boards: ... read more
Trailer Stash: Sherlock Holmes, The Road, more
And now, a look at some notable trailers lighting up blogs and message boards: ... read more
Behind the Scenes at Paste's Decemberists Cover Shoot
The day that The Decemberists gathered at Portland's Newspace Studios to get all dolled up and shot for Paste's May cover by Chris Hornbecker and his crew, no one could believe the weather. After months of sporadic blizzarding and general wintertime malaise in the Rose City, the sun was shining, the mercury was inching up towards 55 and shirt-sleeves were getting gleefully rolled up all over the place. "It was snowing this time last week!" one dumbfounded PA exclaimed, standing out in the parkinglot, squinting up at the cloudless sky. ... read more
Trailer Stash: Antichrist, The Girlfriend Experience, Harry Potter 6, more
And now, a look at some notable trailers lighting up blogs and message boards: ... read more
Trailer Stash: Where the Wild Things Are, Management, In the Loop, more
And now, a look at some notable trailers lighting up the blogs and message boards: ... read more
SXSW 2009: Diplo's new documentary
Last night at the Paramount, a historic downtown Austin theater dating to 1915, mad genius Diplo screened his new documentary Favela On Blast, a valentine to the Brazilian baile funk scene. The 75-minute film takes place exclusively in the hillside Brazilian slums known as favelas, where funk culture thrives. I got a little uneasy in the first minute or two, which features explanatory voiceover from Diplo, but for the rest of the film he remains off camera and lets the favelados tell their own stories. The film feels guided by Diplo's tastes and his deadpan sense of humor, but he knows better... read more
SXSW 2009: Passionate Feelings About Passion Pit
I’ve just returned from our day-party with Brooklyn Vegan, which threw down with a headlining set from one of my favorite new bands, Passion Pit. It’d be easy to say that the Cambridge, Mass. quintet makes dance music for people who hate dance music, but these guys also make dance music for people who like dance music, so here’s the new paradigm: They make dance music for people who like music. ... read more
The Pogues - Atlanta - The Tabernacle - 3/9/2009: Beer, Brawls and Potcheen-doused Brilliance
Even though it’s officially still winter, this is Hotlanta, and inside converted church The Tabernacle, it feels like it’s 100 degrees, 100 percent humidity. The venue’s defining feature, an enormous pipe organ, protrudes from behind the stage backdrop and light scaffolding, a remnant of the place’s holier days. I check my phone. It’s just before 9 p.m. The floor is getting crowded. Roadies meander about the stage, setting up gear. After a while, a rather interesting item is carted out. Sitting ominously, tragically (tragicomically?) at the center of the stage is a lone, padded bar stool—Pogues frontman Shane MacGowan’s seat.... read more
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