Paste's Holiday Gift Guides
As you prepare for your holiday shopping, Paste has you covered with a series of new Gift Guides—offering suggestions for the Movie-, Music-, TV-, Videogame- and Book-Lovers you hold dear. • 10 Gift Ideas for Music Lovers • 10 Gift Ideas for Movie Lovers • 10 Gift Ideas for TV Lovers • 10 Gift Ideas for Videogame Lovers • 10 Gift Ideas for Book Lovers... read more
Paste's Holiday Gift Guide For Movie Lovers
The holiday season is always a great time for movie lovers. Before the year is out, movie fans have options ranging from The Muppets to The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. But why let the fun stop at the theater? Here are 10 great ideas to get your favorite movie lover. read more
Paste's Holiday Gift Guide for Book Lovers
We've scouted out the hottest book releases of the year so you don't have to take a shot in the dark for your favorite book worm. No matter what their tastes are, we think we've got something for everyone. read more
Paste's Holiday Gift Guide For Game Lovers
While there's plenty of excellent individual games to pick up this holiday season, there's also a ton of stuff ranging from nerdy accessories to excellent bundles available that you won't want to miss out on. read more
Paste's Holiday Gift Guide For TV Lovers
In continuation of this week’s gift guides, we turn our attention to something you probably look at everyday. TV lovers know what they want, but sometimes they need help expanding their horizons. It would be easy to give them nothing but their favorite shows on DVD, but there are much more interesting TV-related gifts out there. read more
Paste's Holiday Gift Guide for Music Lovers
As the holidays rapidly approach and you realize you need to think of something better than Justin Bieber's new Christmas album to give your music-obsessed friends (assuming they already have subscriptions to Paste), we're here to help. read more
Gifts For Movie Lovers
The holiday season is always a great time for movie lovers. This holiday season, movie fans have the option to see anything from _The Muppets_ to _The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo._ But why let the fun stop at the theatre? Here are some great ideas to get your favorite movie lover. read more
Three Days In Asheville: Moogfest 2011 Recap
This is the tale of three days in Asheville, N.C. Welcome to Moogfest 2011. read more
Treasure Island Music Festival Preview
With summer in our rear-view mirror and winter barreling down, next weekend’s Treasure Island Music Festival, now in its fifth year running, marks a seasonal last hurrah for those of who crave the energy, chaos, and colorful crowds that tend to go hand-in-hand with dancing outdoors. read more
Live Review: Bob Dylan and Drive-By Truckers at Merriweather Post Pavilion
When music critics are nominating the latest “new Dylan," they usually focus on earnest guitar strummers such as Paul Simon, Steve Forbert, Billy Bragg or Conor Oberst. This ignores the fact that the majority of Dylan’s albums and almost all his live shows since 1966 have featured him as the leader of a loud, rootsy rock ‘n’ roll band. So who are Dylan’s true heirs? Who’s out there telling stories with lively language, iconoclastic aphorisms, evocative details, blues grooves, country twang and rock ‘n’ roll punch?... read more
Little Rock Film Festival 2011: Part Two
Rounding out my coverage of LRFF 2011 are a couple of documentaries with outside-the-mainstream looks at religion, plus a glance back at two entirely different kind of southern films, and a sprinkling of interesting shorts. DOCUMENTARIESSONS OF PERDITION I had heard the news stories about Warren Jeffs, the self-proclaimed prophet and leader of a fundamentalist Mormon church in the Utah desert who was arrested for arranging marriages between men and underage girls. But this engrossing and disturbing film shows the affect his cult-like compound has had on the children who have managed to "escape" into the outside world. What these... read more
Little Rock Film Festival 2011: Part One
Director Hal Needham (Smokey And the Bandit, White Lightning, Cannonball Run) was presented with the Diamond Award for Career Excellence at this year's Little Rock Film Fest. A few hours before the presentation I interviewed Needham who, before directing, was considered to be the greatest and highest paid stuntman in film. The audience was mesmerized by Needham's stories of his many years of work (4500 TV shows and 310 feature films) with stars like Burt Reynolds and John Wayne, and his mishaps that led to 56 broken bones and numerous near-death experiences (like driving the first car to break the... read more
Adventures at BaconFest
It’s 3:45 p.m. at Atlanta’s BaconFest, and a torrential downpour is threatening to put a damper on the day’s festivities. Just as I’m ready to call it a day, a girl with a pig snout painted on her nose runs past through the heavy rains, screaming, “Wooo! I love bacon!” and I suddenly have the feeling that I’m going to fit in here.... read more
A First-Timer’s Field Work at CMJ: Day 5
While it certainly would not be uncalled for to lament missing the surprise performance from Kanye West at Brooklyn Bowl on Saturday night or Daft Punk’s cameo with Phoenix for their encore at Wednesday’s Madison Square Garden show, I think I can find perfect satisfaction in having seen 48 acts over the last five days, most of which were completely new to me. Its an obscene amount of music by anyone’s standards, but when taken in the context of CMJ’s lineup of over 1,000 bands, we’re talking about less than five percent of what was out there. CMJ’ers have no... read more
A First Timer’s Field Work at CMJ: Day 4
A friend told me halfway through my fourth day at CMJ that I would hate music after this week. You’d think that would be the case at the pace of this event (and it certainly is with some of the music I’ve seen), but time is a’tickin on the final day of CMJ and I’m still compelled to go soak in the remaining acts. To a certain extent, this week-long music showcase keeps me running because of the whimsical, almost improvisatory way in which almost everything that’s seen or heard is devoid of expectations. Sure, there’s buzz involved with some... read more
A First Timer’ s Field Work at CMJ: Day 3
So many bands, so little time to write about them because there’s more bands to see! Therein lies one of the numerous challenges of trying to cover an event like the CMJ Music Marathon & Film Festival. Not only is it physically grueling but the band after band onslaught wears on your senses and its easy to be dulled by the experience. Perhaps that’s why this event only allows the best performers to rise to the top. It’s just so easy to let the less notable ones fall to the wayside. In that sense, its hard to imagine that a... read more
A First Timer’s Field Work at CMJ: Day 2
As I watched the fourth of 10 bands that I’d catch on Day 2, the words that were imparted to me by a conference veteran echoed in my mind – “There’s a lot of bad bands at CMJ.” In the interest of keeping this recap more positive and useful, I’ll refrain from ranting about those god-awful examples of what people pass as music and just move on to the notable highlights.... read more
A First-Timer’s Field Work at CMJ: Day 1
The fire-hose has been turned on and the work has begun. For a first-timer at the CMJ Music Marathon & Film Festival that began on Tuesday in New York City, it’s a balancing act between personal planning of bands on my own agenda, following the well-traveled veterans of this 30-year tradition, keeping an ear to the ground for those “in the know” about the bands showing great potential this year, and leaving enough room for spontaneous discoveries along the way. For the first night, the strategy was to stay put at one showcase rather than bounce around to the multitude... read more
ACL Fest - Day One
Coco of The Ettes After parking about a mile from the park I made my usual stop at Green Mesquite for some good Texas BBQ. From there it's one crazy mile of restaurants, food carts, bottled water pushers, street musicians and vendors selling everything else from tobacco to tie-dye. When I hit the park entrance I hesitate. Surely it's a trick. There's sunshine. It's 82 degrees. The grass is green. And dry! Time to forget the monsoons, the mud, and the desert-like temperatures of the past. Time for music. Someplace between Oasis at their loosest and The Ramones at their... read more
ACL Fest 2010 - Unofficial Morning Pre-shows
ACL Fest: Preparing for the Day One more thing to love about Austin is the first-day, Friday morning coverage of ACL Fest on local radio stations KUT and KGSR. Each has early, live concerts with ACL performers on air. I started with KGSR's broadcast from Threadgills, listening to Australia's Angus & Julia Stone whose beautiful "American" harmonies and folk melodies fit perfectly with the Austin vibe. The station's morning guys, Bryan Beck and Andy Langer, also happen to be two of the more music-knowledgeable guys in radio. (Which is great because we're not hearing questions like "Who writes your originals?")... read more
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