Archive for May 2004
All Things Music
This evening ended at the Subway Inn, an aptly named dive slightly uptown from where most of my party people would normally find themselves. But by midnight, only a few of the 20+ strong MTV News team remained. The die hards — Rod, Alyssa, Jem and I — were rewarded by bottle-only beers and a…
Read MoreEminence Front (It’s A Put On)
The problem with stepping out with The Who’s ‘Eminence Front’ on one’s iPod is that one easily confuses one’s self with Sonny Crocket. The off-white coat and aviator glasses contribute, sure, but they can’t be blamed. No, the blame begins with a beat. It’s that late-80s synth sound. Long before Eddie Van Halen’s discovered it…
Read MoreHow To Be Alone
“One of the great adaptive virtues of our brains,” writes Jonathan Franzen in his book, ‘How To Be Alone,’ “is our ability to forget almost everything that has ever happened to us.” I am writing, now, of pain. I ran 13.1 miles in 85 degree heat this morning in a little over two hours. The…
Read MorePart Bard, Part Blogger
Benjamin Wagner has been playing New York’s watering holes since the early 90s. His songs are straightforward, with easy-to-hum melodies and memorable choruses. Now on his sixth CD, the boyish singer/songwriter is part bard, part blogger, crooning about life in the big city and on the road. He’s Ryan Adams without the ‘tude, Pete Yorn…
Read MoreI Dig Music
I bought coffee with quarters this morning, having blown all of my capital on pints of Stella and a long, foggy cab ride home from Brooklyn. I’m currently nursing a thundering headache where my skull connects to my spine, and choking back the mini puke gathering in the back of my throat. None of which…
Read MoreWalter Cronkite & Me
It’s about four in the afternoon. I’m in the corner conference room 29 floors above Times Square. The UN General Assembly building peaks through the skyscrapers down 45th Street. Black sheets of rain are blowing in from the west. The conversation is periodically interrupted by flashes of lightening and claps of thunder. I duck out…
Read MoreI heard it more than once this evening: “We’re all sinners here.” And saints, of course. Just as every cop’s a criminal. Fortunately, when you’re in a family of sinners, at least you’re keeping good company. What’s it all mean? Lemme’ try and explain. Hmmmmm, where to start? Ok, last night. I leave the windows…
Read MoreEdward R. Murrow & The Birth of Broadcast Journalism
I thought I had the job. It was the spring of 1996. I was writing freelance for Rolling Stone Online for fifty bucks an article. I’d graduated from Syracuse’s Newhouse School of Communications two years prior. I’d been in New York City less than six months. I was green. Like, flourescent green. I was dizzy…
Read MoreI’ll take Manhattan in a garbage bag with Latin written on it that says, ‘It’s hard to give a shit these days.’ Don’t let the Fantasy Island get up or Lou Reed lyrics fool ya’: I just wasn’t made for these times, or this place. But that won’t stop me. I moved to New York…
Read MoreCircling The Light
Ten years in my Hell’s Kitchen apartment and only this afternoon I discover roof access? How is that possible? New York, New York: Big City of Anonymity. Last night’s Tribeca Film Festival offering was a documentary called, “James Benning: Circling The Light.” It painstakingly chronicled avant garde filmmaker James Benning’s creative process. Basically, Benning believes…
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