Born to Boss
Springsteen and the rock critics.
David Cohen
· 14 min read
Music
A collection of 47 posts
Seventy Years of Spite and Sophistication
Elvis Costello at three score and ten.
Dave Thompson
· 20 min read
The Man Who Wasn’t There
Richard Morton Jack’s comprehensive new biography of Nick Drake offers a glimpse of a brilliant but troubled soul.
Matt Hanson
· 10 min read
Art over Man: The Roger Waters Test Case
When we create art, we are our best selves, better than the selves we are outside of art.
Thomas P. Balazs
· 9 min read
England’s Daydreaming
Robyn Hitchcock’s new memoir takes us back to 1967—a year the British singer-songwriter never outgrew.
Dave Thompson
· 12 min read
The Road Out of Nowhere
A new book celebrates Springsteen’s stark 1982 classic, ‘Nebraska.’
Matt Hanson
· 6 min read
Master of Reality
“Things were bleak, they really were. Yet nobody was singing about that side of life, which is why we thought we should.”
George Case
· 8 min read
Leonard Bernstein Deserved Better Than ‘Maestro’
Netflix somehow managed to turn the most talented, beloved, and complex American musician in history into a two-dimensional domestic villain.
Daniel Lelchuk
· 9 min read
Rock of Ages
The musical legacy of Robbie Robertson is a monument to the possibilities of American song.
Benjamin Kerstein
· 12 min read
In the Spirit of the Lord
Menacing, exuberant, eccentric, and ambitious—Dylan’s first evangelical record turns two-score and four.
David Cohen
· 16 min read
The Eyes of the Storm
A historic diary in pictures, which just happens to belong to Sir Paul McCartney.
Hannah Gal
· 14 min read
Belafonte Reappraised
Neither hagiographers nor haters of the late musician, actor, and activist have managed to get him right.
Ronald Radosh
· 18 min read
Holy Roller
A tribute to Chris Bailey, the late frontman and co-founder of Australian punk band the Saints, who died a year ago today.
David Cohen
· 11 min read
Paul Was Dead Right
Reappraising one of British journalism’s most notorious pieces of cultural criticism.
George Case
· 6 min read
Nick Cave’s Lessons in Grief
The singer’s new book awakened me to a paradoxical fact: tragedy can sometimes remind us of what makes life worth living.
Neil Gray
· 7 min read