The emotional restlessness and partnership-paranoia brought on by the doldrums of stay-at-home parenting fuel the polished, subtly poignant On the Rocks (Apple TV). It’s the latest effort from writer-director Sofia Coppola, who has certainly made more stylish films over the… Read More
Blue Note was one of the most important American jazz labels of the 1960s and 1970s with a roster of stellar talents including Horace Silver, Jimmy Smith, Lee Morgan, Art Blakey, Grant Green, and Wayne Shorter. They were known for… Read More
13. James Wan In a close race with fellow horror geek Guillermo Del Toro, Wan wins out, if only because he’s made three amazing examples of movie macabre — Saw, The Conjuring, and Insidious — and ended up jumpstarting three… Read More
Dustin Laurenzi is a busy man with a list of musical projects that would make the average artist cower in intimidation. But unlike many overachievers who tend to spread their musical talents too thin, virtually everything the Chicago-based tenor saxophonist… Read More
Joe Wong had arrived at what felt like a crossroads. He’d been making music, both as a touring drummer and as a film and television composer for 20 years. In 2012, Wong moved west from Milwaukee to Los Angeles, but… Read More
Canadian singer-songwriter Helena Deland titled her first full-length release Someone New, and I daresay this will be true for most listeners. Deland’s smaller projects had created a buzz in the indie world. She and her music have been the subject… Read More
“I’m not gonna beg / Won’t beg for you anymore.” Those are the opening lines on “The Tell”, the first song on CF Watkins’ new album, Babygirl. It’s an affirmation of empowerment and sets up this striking new album with… Read More
Floodlights are a fresh-faced, coed group from Melbourne, Australia who make music that sounds exactly like one might expect from a fresh-faced, coed Australian indie rock group. At one point in indie history, bands might have flinched at being described… Read More
“And imperfect men, possessing superhuman material power, are not a reassuring prospect.” — Marshall McLuhan, The Mechanical Bride (1951) No One Is Coming to Save Us From Ourselves I keep thinking about that moment in J. R. R. Tolkien’s The… Read More
At several points on Small World, the debut album from Gamblers, the Long Island-based indie-pop outfit, wears the sunny disposition of the Beach Boys on its collective sleeve, as jangly guitars automatically conjure up images of summer, sand, and surf.… Read More