Apr 2008
His Holiness in the Pacific Northwest
Apr/04/2008 Filed in: cornerpocket
As a result of the Dalai Lama's recent visit to the Pacific Northwest, I've been inspired to create, collect and share various sounds and words I've created to honor him and his work in this world. Here are some links to pages throughout this site that will hook you up with downloadable wisdom:
You can stream or download a podcast of his 2008 talk from Seattle here and his 2004 talk from Vancouver, B.C. here.
I wrote a story about the Dalai Lama's visit to Seattle for the Cascadia Weekly newspaper; it also discusses author Pico Iyer's new biopgraphy The Open Road: The Global Journey of the Fourteenth Dalai Lama. You can view and/or download a pdf of the story right over here. Another story I wrote about the Dalai Lama's 2004 visit to Vancouver B.C. is available here.
Finally, DJ Fundi posted a mix entitled "A Lament for Tibet" featuring music from the Himalayan region at the Podcast Cafe right here.
Namaste.
(updated 5/19/08)click here to read more...
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"Return of the Rock Lobsters"
Apr/04/2008 Filed in: music
reviews
RETURN OF THE ROCK LOBSTERS
By Marc Spitz/The New York Times
(Listen to The B-52's live on stage in Montego Bay, Jamaica, circa 1982 and preview their new album "Funplex" over at the Podcast Cafe's Live Archive!)
A harsh wind is blowing around the four members of the B-52s as they view Lower Manhattan from a seventh-floor observation balcony at the New Museum, which rises over a nearby flophouse on a gentrifying stretch of the Bowery. From this height, they can see every newly opened bar, cafe and boutique. “The neighborhood didn’t look anything like this,” said the guitarist Keith Strickland, 54, referring to the late 1970s, when these new wave pioneers from Athens, Ga., first conquered the downtown rock scene. “I walked out this morning and said, ‘Where am I?’ ”
A few minutes earlier, the band, which also includes the vocalists Kate Pierson, 59, Cindy Wilson, 51, and Fred Schneider, 56, had traveled a few short blocks south from the retro-chic Bowery Hotel, which opened on the site of a former gas station last year. Along the way, the four had passed the shuttered storefront of CBGB, the punk club, now defunct, where fans in Fiorucci dresses and vintage sharkskin suits lined up to hear the band’s primal yet lyrically futurist dance-rock. “Oh, CBGBs,” Ms. Wilson said mournfully.
“Kiss it for luck,” Mr. Strickland said to Mr. Schneider.
“I’m not kissing that,” he replied with a mock shudder.
On the eve of “Funplex” (Astralwerks), the band’s first studio release in 16 years, the B-52s are reckoning with a new frontier that barely resembles the one they imagined on optimistic tracks like their 1983 single “Song for a Future Generation.” “We have to jump back into the void we left behind,” Mr. Schneider said. “We’ve gone through three different types of music eras or styles since we put out our last album. People watched MTV. Now everyone’s on the In-ter-net.”
click here to read more...
By Marc Spitz/The New York Times
(Listen to The B-52's live on stage in Montego Bay, Jamaica, circa 1982 and preview their new album "Funplex" over at the Podcast Cafe's Live Archive!)
A harsh wind is blowing around the four members of the B-52s as they view Lower Manhattan from a seventh-floor observation balcony at the New Museum, which rises over a nearby flophouse on a gentrifying stretch of the Bowery. From this height, they can see every newly opened bar, cafe and boutique. “The neighborhood didn’t look anything like this,” said the guitarist Keith Strickland, 54, referring to the late 1970s, when these new wave pioneers from Athens, Ga., first conquered the downtown rock scene. “I walked out this morning and said, ‘Where am I?’ ”
A few minutes earlier, the band, which also includes the vocalists Kate Pierson, 59, Cindy Wilson, 51, and Fred Schneider, 56, had traveled a few short blocks south from the retro-chic Bowery Hotel, which opened on the site of a former gas station last year. Along the way, the four had passed the shuttered storefront of CBGB, the punk club, now defunct, where fans in Fiorucci dresses and vintage sharkskin suits lined up to hear the band’s primal yet lyrically futurist dance-rock. “Oh, CBGBs,” Ms. Wilson said mournfully.
“Kiss it for luck,” Mr. Strickland said to Mr. Schneider.
“I’m not kissing that,” he replied with a mock shudder.
On the eve of “Funplex” (Astralwerks), the band’s first studio release in 16 years, the B-52s are reckoning with a new frontier that barely resembles the one they imagined on optimistic tracks like their 1983 single “Song for a Future Generation.” “We have to jump back into the void we left behind,” Mr. Schneider said. “We’ve gone through three different types of music eras or styles since we put out our last album. People watched MTV. Now everyone’s on the In-ter-net.”
click here to read more...
Erykah Badu's "New Amerykah"
Apr/04/2008 Filed in: music
reviews
MONARCH
Erykah Badu transforms the flotsam and jetsam of hip-hop.
by Sasha Frere-Jones/The New Yorker
On a Monday evening in August of 1996, I went to see the Roots perform at the Knitting Factory, in downtown Manhattan. The band had come from Philadelphia for a three-night stand in support of their “illadelph halflife” album. At one point during the set, I noticed a tall woman with an enormous head wrap standing in the front row of the crowd. Toward the end of the evening, the group’s bassist, Leonard (Hub) Hubbard, gestured for the woman to come onstage. The lead rapper, Tariq (Black Thought) Trotter, announced, “This is a friend of ours from Dallas, Texas. Her name is Erykah Badu.”click here to read more...
Erykah Badu transforms the flotsam and jetsam of hip-hop.
by Sasha Frere-Jones/The New Yorker
On a Monday evening in August of 1996, I went to see the Roots perform at the Knitting Factory, in downtown Manhattan. The band had come from Philadelphia for a three-night stand in support of their “illadelph halflife” album. At one point during the set, I noticed a tall woman with an enormous head wrap standing in the front row of the crowd. Toward the end of the evening, the group’s bassist, Leonard (Hub) Hubbard, gestured for the woman to come onstage. The lead rapper, Tariq (Black Thought) Trotter, announced, “This is a friend of ours from Dallas, Texas. Her name is Erykah Badu.”click here to read more...