// Category Archive for: Reviews

Rick Springfield’s Beginnings: Younger Than Tomorrow, Wise As Yesterday

By Cait Brennan

I can’t prove this, but I suspect Rick Springfield‘s career began with the discovery of a magic lamp. A magic lamp with a particularly devious Jinn contained therein. Since he was a teenager, Springfield has been on the receiving end of some of the luckiest breaks a young rocker could’ve wished for in his wildest dreams. Yet too many of them went inexplicably off the rails despite his formidable talents. Such was his major-label debut, the indispensable, shoulda-been-a-smash Beginnings, released in 1972 on Capitol and recently reissued by a great new label called Real Gone Music. It’s one of 1972’s best albums, and one of the best you’ll hear in 2012, too.
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Johnny Headband, Who Cooks For You?

By Less Lee Moore

Who Cooks For You? is the latest release from Detroit’s Johnny Headband, featuring brothers Chad and Keith Thompson (the latter of Electric Six), plus Gerald Roesser and and Robbie Saunders. Like the music itself, Who Cooks For You? poses an unanswered (or unanswerable) question: Who (or what) is Johnny Headband? Who Cooks For You? seems familiar yet it’s not beholden to current “indie” music trends; it refuses to be pigeonholed but all the same, it is one ridiculously enjoyable album. Who Cooks For You? crams a lot of flavor into its 35 minutes.

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The Cabin In The Woods (spoiler free!)

By Lisa Anderson

Do you love the horror genre, but feel like it’s in a rut? Do you like rooting for main characters in a terrifying situation, but find that in recent movies, they’re often one-dimensional or unlikable? Do you enjoy the exquisite treat of being confronted with a Big Bad that’s been built up for over an hour . . . but wish that could happen without a lot of sexism or torture porn?

If, so, fortunately, Joss Whedon agrees with you.
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Battle Royale: The Complete Collection

By Less Lee Moore

For those (like me) who have not yet been seduced by the legendary Japanese film Battle Royale, this new Anchor Bay collection—featuring the theatrical cut, the 2001 special edition, Battle Royale: Requiem, plus a disc of featurettes and extras—is nothing short of jaw-dropping. The four-disc set comes in a beautifully packaged booklet and is available in both DVD and Blu-Ray formats.

Battle Royale was originally released in 2000, and was adapted from Koushun Takami’s controversial 1999 novel of the same name. The film exploded into the new millennium, riveting audiences, breaking box office records, outraging censors, and transfixing a generation of film nerds like Quentin Tarantino. Its synopsis is straightforward:

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Letters To Kurt by Eric Erlandson

By Emily Carney

Whether you liked Nirvana or not, if you grew up in the 1990s, your cultural map was dotted with the band’s landmark accomplishments. I vividly remember the debut of Nevermind in 1991, the Sassy magazine with Kurtney on the cover (Kurt Cobain had pink hair and he and Courtney Love both looked like elegant street urchins), the band’s MTV Unplugged, Kurt’s first horrifying suicide attempt in Rome (my best friend told me about it the morning it happened at the bus stop—we had just turned 16), and the world premiere of Hole’s “Miss World” video about a week later.

Then April 8, 1994 swung by. Along with it, the awful news of Kurt Cobain’s suicide by gun. My best friend again called my house after school and told me authorities thought they’d found Kurt’s body in his house. Of course, that nomenclature is never good. Even though I was not a super-fan, I was genuinely saddened by the awful manner of Kurt’s demise. The grief was only exacerbated two months later by the overdose death of Hole’s bassist, the beautiful, gifted Kristen Pfaff. It felt, genuinely, like all of my era’s talents were being plucked off, one by one.
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Dinosaur Jr., BUG Live at 9:30 Club: In the Hands of the Fans

By J Howell

The bulk of BUG Live at 9:30 Club was shot by six fans who won an online contest to interview Dinosaur Jr. and film them performing their third album, 1988’s Bug, in its entirety at the legendary DC club in June of last year. The subtitle of “in the hands of the fans” isn’t just appropriate considering the film’s production, though. In the hands of fans from way back is the best place for the DVD.
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Mark Lindsay, The Complete Columbia Singles

By Melissa Bratcher

Mark Lindsay will ever be known as the dreamy, ponytailed lead singer of Paul Revere and the Raiders. He left the band to begin a solo career and recorded a series of albums for Columbia Records in the 1970s. The Complete Columbia Singles thoughtfully gathers his singles for the label into a handy chronological package.

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The Red Bird Girls: very first time in true Stereo 1964-1966 (Various Artists)

By Melissa Bratcher

There are few moments that can’t be improved upon by a good song from a girl group. Happiness is magnified, heartbreak is more monumental, a pretty summer day shines with sweet harmonies, “yeah yeahs,” and fantastic hairdos. I’m pretty sure that’s a scientific fact.

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Carole King, Pearls: Songs of Goffin and King

By Emily Carney

Some context on Carole King: This singer songwriter, who is rather unfairly relegated to oldies radio stations in the US, had serious credibility within the world of girl-groups in the 1960s. At age 18, she co-wrote “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow” with her then-husband Gerry Goffin, which was performed by the Shirelles. This song was covered beautifully in recent years by the late Amy Winehouse.
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Paul Weller, Sonik Kicks

By Jemiah Jefferson

This is Paul Weller’s eleventh solo album and “The Modfather” shows no signs of becoming complacent, stymied, or anything less than a phenomenal songwriter and musician. Sonik Kicks contains almost too much variety in style and approach, and while it doesn’t necessarily smoothly flow from track to track, there is excellence aplenty to admire.
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