You would never suspect from this big ol’ rock ’n’ roll show that The Black Crowes was essentially toast just a few years ago.
Film Review: “Blue Bayou” — “I’m Going Back Someday…”
Blue Bayou’s story deserves to be told and heard. But rather than focus slowly and intently on its central crisis, the script kneads in a dizzying array of additional threads and sidelines.
Television Review: “Chicago Party Aunt” — Livin’ the Vida Loca, Windy City Style
The bizarre half hour animated comedy is a hilarious love letter to The Windy City.
Rock Album Review: The Plastic Ono Band Celebrates 50 — A Nice Warm Cup of Instant Karma
After having diagnosed the ails of modernity, screamed out his most deeply held traumas, and shrugged off his role in the biggest band ever, John Lennon is content to have a riverside cuddle under a tree in the sun with the woman he loves. Amen.
Television Review: “Sex Education,” Season 3 — Growing Up Grand
Amid the political point-scoring, Netflix’s Sex Education remains effervescently charming.
Classical Album Review: An Opera by the “Croatian Verdi” — Sung Right
The performance shows generally high competence and comfort, no surprise given that the work is a longtime staple in Croatia: indeed, it is the single most-performed opera in the entire repertory of the Croatian National Theater.
Music Remembrance: Singer-songwriter Nanci Griffith (1953-2021)
There were no performers who possessed more talent than singer-songwriter Nanci Griffith in the 1980s and early ’90s, when she was at her remarkable best.
Concert Review: King Crimson and The Zappa Band — Carrying On the Legacy
Both King Crimson and The Zappa Band made the best of treating old catalogs as historical repertory.
Film Review: “Martyrs Lane” — Haunts of Childhood
Martyrs Lane doesn’t unfold like a typical ghost story; it’s more of a mystery seen through a child’s eyes.
Theater Interview: “Moonlight Abolitionists” — Graveyard Shift
“In these plays, part of my job is to unflatten history in a way that’s engaging, and also shows us that it’s okay for us to feel overwhelmed and confused and scared by the world — that we’re not so different from the people who came before us. They got through it, and we will, too.”