Euphoria Becomes Drenched in Death
The date is January 30, 2022. Not so long ago in some ways, and a lifetime ago in others. For one thing, two particular famous [Read More…]
Lizzo Just Kind of Ruined Barbie
As though Barbie: The Album wasn’t already suffering enough (critically, not commercially), Lizzo had to go and get herself accused of, among other things, sexual [Read More…]
Pee-wee’s Big Capitulation: As “Weird” As Pee-wee Was, He Was Still A Material Boy of the 80s
Perhaps it’s difficult to imagine a world in which “weird” isn’t a sellable commodity. It certainly wasn’t an effortless sell in the Reagan 80s. Not [Read More…]
The Fan/Performer Dynamic Keeps Getting Decidedly More Employer/Employee
It used to seem so glamorous to be an “entertainer.” Yet even that word has connotations of being like a monkey with cymbals, “programmed” to [Read More…]
Stop Calling Barbie “Escapist Fun”
For the most part, Barbie has held fast to its reputation as an old school work of art in the (im)pure studio system sense of [Read More…]
Why Aidan’s Visceral Reaction to Not Wanting to Go Into Carrie’s Apartment Ever Again Is Emblematic of New York-Specific PTSD
With the latest episode of And Just Like That…, the one everyone is raving about/saying it’s marked a shift for the better in the series, [Read More…]
Barbie: The Album Might Cut It In Barbie Land, But Not in the Real World
With a movie as instantaneously revered as Barbie, it’s only natural to expect an accompanying soundtrack that might do it justice. And sure, the Barbie [Read More…]
Platonic Still Ends Up Perpetuating the Trope That Men and Women Can’t Be Friends…At Least Not Without Some Eyebrow-Raising and An Unspoken Expiration Date
In the tradition of movies and shows that address the complicated subject of straight male-straight female friendships, Platonic adds to the canon in a more [Read More…]
Unlike Most Women in Music, Tony Bennett Didn’t Have to Constantly Change His Image In Order to Endure
“I was like the Madonna and the Michael Jackson of my day,” Tony Bennett once told Conan O’Brien during a 1993 interview. The notable distinction [Read More…]
Tony Bennett: The Model Italian-American (Or At Least Less Affronting Than Most)
As a second generation Italian-American (with his mother, Anna Suraci, born right after his grandmother arrived in the U.S.), Tony Bennett had the potential to [Read More…]
