Although the music on his Ziggy Stardust album is one of David Bowie’s career highs, it was the theatricality surrounding it that was truly revolutionary. His androgynous glam-spaceman persona was stunningly exotic in 1973, and the sense of drama created by the lavishly conceived live shows helped make the Ziggy period one of the most … Read more
Plenty of Hollywood types lead secret lives, but nobody beats the tale spun by Chuck Barris in his 1982 autobiography: He claims that when he wasn’t goofing with Jaye P. Morgan as host of The Gong Show, he was jetting around the world for the CIA, using his cover as a TV producer to mask … Read more
This sixpack sarcophagus of cinema, screening in conjunction with the MIA’s “Eternal Egypt” exhibit (see our preview, p. 17), offers a half-dozen films showcasing Hollywood’s take on the time of the Pharaohs. While you wouldn’t want to confuse any of these with a history lesson, as sheer entertainment, they ain’t just Cheops liver. Three versions … Read more
We can’t help but feel silly admitting our fondness for the music of Elton John. But dammit, we won’t let our admiration for his stellar 1970s work be overshadowed by the syrupy Lion King and the crap, Lady Di-inspired reworking of “Candle in the Wind.” (For crying out loud, lyricist Bernie Taupin did all the … Read more
It’s a stretch to call this a best-of disc, considering that two songs are brand new and five others are remixes. But this was an uneven decade for U2. Except for the brilliant reinvention on 1991’s Achtung Baby that shattered their “poster boys of earnestness” pigeonhole, the 90s found Bono and the boys struggling to … Read more
Tori lost us with 1996’s bloated Boys For Pele, but we could sense a possible resurgence on last year’s underrated covers album Strange Little Girls. Her new disc, all originals this time, isn’t a total artistic comeback (and in fact a few songs are just plain dull), but it has plenty of strong moments, some … Read more
We have been taught recently that the landscape can be a very sublime thing indeed, drippy with sentiment and aloof in its monumentality. But the landscape can also be ecstatic and alive; brimming with life and radiant in its myriad hues. This is the landscape vision of Thomas Paquette, a former Minnesotan turned peripatetic. His … Read more
This is the best kind of pyramid scheme. Spanning 35 centuries, this massive traveling exhibition showcases nearly 150 items from the English national museum’s collection of Egyptiana, many of which haven’t left England since, well, arriving from Cairo. Although the MIA is complementing the show with a display of locally owned mummies, the exhibit proper … Read more
In recent years, wags of varying levels of hostility have suggested, with some drama, that Uncle Sam should require licenses of all parents and would-be parents. Well, we don’t know about that, but we do know that there are a handful of charitable organizations that work with sincerity and sympathy to improve the lot of … Read more
Pinocchio apparently isn’t the only one who wants to be a real boy. At age 50, Roberto Benigni is perhaps more suited to play the grandfatherly Gepetto than the marionette whose nose grows when he lies. But to give him his due, Benigni’s best performances have always been touched with childlike wonder, and if anyone … Read more