Borges and $: The Parable of the Literary Master and the Coin

"I fell in love with Jorge Luis Borges when I was a freshman in college. That year, full of hope and confusion, I left my hometown for the manicured quads of Brown University, desperately seeking culture—art, beauty, and meaning beyond the empty narrative of wealth building that consumes our world. It is easy to look back and see why Borges spoke to me. The Argentine fabulist’s short stories were like beautiful mind-altering crystals, each one an Escheresque maze that toyed with our realities—time, space, honor, death—as mere constructs, nothing more. With the beautiful prose of a poet-translator-scholar, he could even make money seem like mere fantasy. It was precisely the narrative someone like me might want. ..."
Longreads

2009 August: Jorge Luis Borges, 2013 May: Jorge Luis Borges - 1, 2013 October: Borges: Profile of a Writer Presents the Life and Writings of Argentina’s Favorite Son, Jorge Luis Borges.

Fintan Magee, Puerto Rico, and Rising Sea Levels

"Fintan Magee chose this water tower shape to feature a local San Juan boy carrying an iceberg – while the water levels rise and flood his world. Perhaps he is remarking on the fact that we are burdening the next generation of people with a host of ecological disasters to carry on their backs. The Australian artist has been merging his graffiti practice and studio practice on the streets in large murals in recent years and often he uses the opportunity to speak to social and environmental ills, many on a global scale. ..."
Brooklyn Street Art

Walker Evans: Labor Anonymous

"Walker Evans shot the photographs collected in Labor Anonymous as an assignment for Fortune magazine, which published a small selection of 20 images in its November 1946 issue, under the title 'On a Saturday Afternoon in Detroit.' Until now, however, the entire series of 50 photographs has never been reproduced. Evans’ extraordinary serial studies of the facial expressions and postures of Detroit workers walking the city’s streets are fascinating both as portraiture and as a surprising dimension of his photographic style. ... This book compiles the photographs, contact sheets, small-version printlets, Evans’ annotations to newspaper clippings, drafts for an unpublished text, telegrams and every available print Evans made, along with the Fortune spread as published. ..."
ArtBook
New Yorker: Walker Evans’s Typology of the American Worker

2011 June: Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, 2011 May: A Revolutionary Project: Cuba from Walker Evans to Now, 2013 June: Cotton Tenants: Three Families, 2014 May: “Walker Evans and Robert Frank – An Essay on Influence by Tod Papageorge” (1981), 2014 October: Walker Evans: The Magazine Work, 2014 December: Walker Evans: Decade by Decade, 2015 August: Walker Evans: A Life's Work, 2015 October: Walker Evans’ “lineup of faces” on the subway.

Stuart Davis: In Full Swing

Owh! in San Pao, 1951
"Stuart Davis (1892–1964) is one of the preeminent figures of American modernism. With a long career that stretched from the early twentieth century well into the postwar era, he brought a distinctively American accent to international modernism. Faced with the choice between realism and pure abstraction early in his career, Davis invented a vocabulary that harnessed the grammar of abstraction to the speed and simultaneity of modern America. By merging the bold, hard-edged style of advertising with the conventions of European avant-garde painting, he created an art endowed with the vitality and dynamic rhythms that he saw as uniquely modern and American. In the process, he achieved a rare synthesis: an art that is resolutely abstract, yet at the same time exudes the spirit of popular culture. ..."
Whitney
NY Times - Stuart Davis: A Little Matisse, a Lot of Jazz, All American
W - Stuart Davis
amazon - Stuart Davis: In Full Swing
vimeo: Stuart Davis: In Full Swing

People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm - A Tribe Called Quest (1990)

"One year after De la Soul re-drew the map for alternative rap, fellow Native Tongues brothers A Tribe Called Quest released their debut, the quiet beginning of a revolution in non-commercial hip-hop. People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm floated a few familiar hooks, but it wasn't a sampladelic record. Rappers Q-Tip and Phife Dawg dropped a few clunky rhymes, but their lyrics were packed with ideas, while their flow and interplay were among the most original in hip-hop. From the beginning, Tribe focused on intelligent message tracks but rarely sounded over-serious about them. ... Restless and ceaselessly imaginative, Tribe perhaps experimented too much on their debut, but they succeeded at much of it, certainly enough to show much promise as a new decade dawned."
allmusic
W - People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm
Pitchfork
Genius (Video)
YouTube: I Left My Wallet In El Segundo
YouTube: People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm (Full album)

2011 May: A Tribe Called Quest, 2014 October: The Low End Theory (1991), 2015 June: Midnight Marauders (1993)

La commare secca - Bernardo Bertolucci (1962)

Wikipedia - "La commare secca (literally 'The skinny gossip', English title The Grim Reaper) is the 1962 Italian film written and directed by Bernardo Bertolucci, based on a story by Pier Paolo Pasolini. It was Bertolucci's directorial debut at age 21. ... The film begins with the brutal image of a prostitute's corpse on the bank of the Tiber in Rome. We then see a series of interrogations of suspects by the police, all of whom are known to have been in a nearby park at the time of the murder. Each suspect recounts his activities during the day and evening, and each narrative serves as a slice of life story. A young man tells the police that he was meeting with priests in order to get a job recommendation, though we see that he and his friends spent the time trying to rob lovers in the park. ..."
Wikipedia
Criterion Reflections
NY Times
YouTube: Intervista a Bernardo Bertolucci

2008 July: Bernardo Bertolucci, 2011 November: The Last Emperor (1987)

William Glackens, "Crowd at the Seashore," 1910

"Glackens was known to visit Coney Island, and this canvas may depict the throngs that gathered there. The number and variety of beachgoers suggest the socioeconomic diversity of New York City and imbue the painting with an exuberant spirit. To heighten the scene’s electric energy, Glackens deployed vibrant color and vigorous brushwork, applying saturated blues and oranges in jittery dashes to evoke the midday sun’s heat and glare. The brilliance of 'Crowd at the Seashore' epitomizes the particular brand of Impressionism—inspired by Auguste Renoir—that Glackens adopted after about 1910."
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art - 1
Getting Lost in the Crowd

Mississippi Fred Mc Dowell - Mississippi Blues (1965)

"'Mississippi' Fred McDowell played simple, haunting blues with vivid, demonstrative passion and power. He wasn't a great guitarist, but his voicings and backings were always memorable, while his singing never lacked intensity or conviction or failed to hold interest. This 1965 set contains mostly McDowell compositions, with the exception of the set's final number, a nearly seven-minute exposition of Big Bill Broonzy's 'Louise.' Assisted only at times by his wife Annie, Fred McDowell makes every song entertaining, whether they're humorous, poignant, reflective, or bemused."
allmusic
Discogs
Lyrics - 61 Highway Blues
YouTube: Mississippi Blues
01 - Some Day Baby 02 - Milk Cow Blues 03 - The Train I Ride 04 - Over The Hill 05 - Goin' Down To The River 06 - I Wished I Were In Heaven Sitt 07 - Louise 08 - Germany Blues 09 - Some Sweet Day 10 - The Sun Rose This Morning 11 - When I Lay My Burden Down 12 - Goin' Down To Louisiana

2010 September: Mississippi Fred McDowell

How to Look at Art: A Short Visual Guide by Cartoonist Lynda Barry

"Despite the small, narrative doodle posted to her Tumblr a couple of weeks back, inspirational teacher and cartoonist Lynda Barry clearly has no shortage of strategies for viewing art in a meaningful way. She takes a Socratic approach with students and readers eager to forge a deeper personal connection to images. She traces this tendency back forty years, to when she studied with Marilyn Frasca at Evergreen State College. Could Frasca have anticipated what she wrought when she asked the young Barry, 'What is an image?' ..."
Open Culture
The Paris Review - Lynda Barry on ‘Picture This’ (2010)

2011 July: Lynda Barry

Dadaglobe Reconstructed

Francis Picabia. Tableau Rastadada. 1920.
"Dadaglobe Reconstructed reunites over 100 works created for Dadaglobe, Tristan Tzara’s planned but unrealized magnum opus, originally slated for publication in 1921. An ambitious anthology that aimed to document Dada’s international activities, Dadaglobe was not merely a vehicle for existing works, but served as a catalyst for the production of new ones. Tzara invited some 50 artists from 10 countries to submit artworks in four categories: photographic self-portraits, photographs of artworks, original drawings, and layouts for book pages. The exhibition brings together these photographs, drawings, photomontages, and collages, along with a selection of related archival material, to reconstruct this volume. Though never published, due to financial and organizational difficulties, Tzara’s project addresses concerns about art’s reproducibility that continue to be relevant today."
MoMA (Video)
W - Dadaglobe
U Chicago: Dadaglobe Reconstructed
WSJ: ‘Dadaglobe Reconstructed’ and ‘Dada Universal’ Review
NY Times: 36 Hours in Zurich
juxtapoz

The best of Fela Kuti mix by DJ Ras Sjamaan

"Tracklist: Water No Get Enemy, Mr Follow Follow, Observation I No Crime, Kalakutashow, Excuse O, Trouble Sleep and Yanga Wake AM. Fela Kuti also known as Fela Anikulapo Kuti or simply Fela, was a Nigerian multi-instrumentalist, musician, composer, pioneer of the Afrobeat music genre, human rights activist, and political maverick. ... Afrobeat is characterized by a fairly large band with many instruments, vocals, and a musical structure featuring jazzy, funky horn sections. A riff-based 'endless groove' is used, in which a base rhythm of drums, shekere, muted West African-style guitar, and melodic bass guitar riffs are repeated throughout the song. Commonly, interlocking melodic riffs and rhythms are introduced one by one, building the groove bit-by-bit and layer-by-layer. The horn section then becomes prominent, introducing other riffs and main melodic themes. ..."
YouTube: The best of Fela Kuti mix by DJ Ras Sjamaan (Video) 1:14:09

NIKE FRANCE | SPARK BRILLIANCE

"It all begins with a flash of genius. For Blaise Matuidi, it was a move from PSG’s legend: Jay-Jay Okocha. Now, it’s Blaise who is setting the game on fire, not just on the pitch, but throughout French popular culture. Known to the kids as The Charo (the vulture), he has sparked an entire phenomenon called Charo Life. Which in turn, became the spark for our campaign for France, host nation of the Euro Champs 2016."
Stéphane Missier (Video)

The Crumbling Glories of Kolkata

"Bengalis have always believed Kolkata to be one of the best cities in the world. It is, after all, home to Nobel prize winners, mathematicians and scientists, movie directors, writers, and artists. These people make up the essence of what famous Indian journalist Vir Shangvi called the 'city with a soul.' But the buildings also have their own story to tell. When I was about eight or nine years old, my father often took me out for walks in the northern part of the city. I remember looking at the crumbling aristocratic mansions that stood at almost every corner there. I always felt fearful looking at them; they looked like haunted houses. My father would try and explain their history but his lessons didn’t stick, and when I left Kolkata for modern cities like Singapore, Beijing, and Shanghai, I almost forgot this part of my hometown. ..."
Roads and Kingdoms

Tour the West Village’s Neon Signs with New York Neon Author Thomas Rinaldi

"Greenwich Village is blessed with an especially dense concentration of vintage neon signs. Signs like these advertised businesses large and small throughout the city beginning in the 1920s and 1930s. They fell out of favor in the 1960s due to rising costs, restrictive zoning ordinances, and the appearance of less costly forms of outdoor advertising. In recent years, they have all but disappeared as old, independent businesses across the city have succumbed to rent hikes and old age. This new tour on July 7th at 7:30 pm with Thomas Rinaldi, author of New York Neon will take us past about a dozen signs dating to the 1930s, ’40s and ’50s, marking the locations of some of the neighborhood’s most stalwart restaurants, bars and small businesses. ..."
untapped cities

Crowds Are Out, Crates Are In as Louvre Takes Flood Precautions

"The square at the center of the Louvre, dominated by I.M. Pei’s glass pyramid, was desolate early Friday morning, save for a few tourists taking selfies. The museum was closed to visitors, as Paris experienced its worst flooding since 1982 — but inside, staff members and volunteers had worked around the clock to remove artworks from the threat of the rising waters of the Seine River. I was part of a small group of journalists whom the French culture minister, Audrey Azoulay; the museum’s president, Jean-Luc Martinez; and other officials took on a tour of the strangely vacant museum on Friday afternoon. ..."
NY Times (Video)
BBC - Paris floods: Louvre and Orsay close to protect exhibits
Wired - The Plan to Save the Louvre’s Art From Floods: Pumps, Dams, and Evacuation (Video)
Guardian - Paris floods: 'There's something terrifying about it' (Video)
Independent - Paris floods: River Seine reaches highest level in decades as Louvre museum closed 'for precautionary reasons' (Video)

DJ Cam - Liquid Hip-hop (2014)

"In an effort most worthy of discussion for 2004’s 'Best Of, but Barely Mentioned' lists, DJ Cam achieves every goal of the successful DJ record itinerary in Liquid Hip-hop. He makes room for his impressive scratching on almost every soulful track, and rolls out incisive vocal samples over smooth electronic soundscapes, or spikes dusty breaks with piano loops and cuts of brass. All of this magic is credited on the record sleeve to the French beatmaker, of course, but he also attributes his work to the MPC 3000. ..."
popmatters
allmusic - DJ Cam
YouTube: Liquid Hip Hop (Complete album)

Elliott Hundley - There Is No More Firmament

"Regen Projects is pleased to present an exhibition of new work by Los Angeles-based artist Elliott Hundley. On view will be a series of billboard collages and a sculpture that form an ongoing visual narrative. This will be the artist’s fourth solo presentation at the gallery. Known for his dense multimedia compositions that reference both art history and mythology, Hundley’s work weaves together scenes from the past with familiar imagery taken from the contemporary world. Whereas previous bodies of work have focused on classical Greek tales such as Euripides’s tragedy The Bacchae, this exhibition presents a shift in subject matter, moving from antiquity to the modern, and is loosely based on Antonin Artaud’s play There Is No More Firmament. Devoid of a traditional narrative structure and identifiable protagonists, the play utilizes visuals, sound, gesture, and language to confront the viewer and create an impactful, visceral state of chaos. ..."
Elliott Hundley: There Is No More Firmament
Elliott Hundley: There Is No More Firmament - Installation
LA Times - Datebook: Otherworldly collage-paintings, prison art, C.O.L.A. grant winners' work goes on view

Here's pretty much every song used in a Wes Anderson film

"Wes Anderson buffs, this one's for you: an anonymous superfan has created an exhaustive, 166-track playlist of literally almost every song that has appeared in the director's eight-film ouvre. Need a soundtrack for your slo-mo walk to meet your half-brother, who's secretly in love with you, ala The Royal Tenenbaums? Or a backing track for your beachside dance with your pre-teen boyfriend, as shown in Moonrise Kingdom? It's all here. ..."
DAZED (soundtrack)
vimeo: Sound Part I / Candice Drouet

2013 November: Wes Anderson Honors Fellini in a Delightful New Short Film, 2013 November: Rushmore (1998), 2013 Decemher: Hotel Chevalier (2007), 2014 March: Wes Anderson Collection, 2014 April: The Perfect Symmetry of Wes Anderson’s Movies, 2014 July: The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014), 2014 August: Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009), 2014 December: Welcome to Union Glacier (2013), 2015 January: Inhabiting Wes Anderson’s Universe, 2015 July: Books in the Films of Wes Anderson: A Supercut for Bibliophiles, 2015 November: Moonrise Kingdom (2012), 2015 December: Chapter 8: "The Grand Budapest Hotel".

"Juke Box Comics" - One Last Wallow

"... Since I am always prepping future blog posts well in advance, there is a pile of sort-of-related things left to present here, and it will be a little bit of a jumble sale. Today, we'll be going through the rest of the six-issue run of 'Juke Box Comics' (we have presented some bits from the first two issues here before) from the late 1940s and combing out the best from those lovely books, as well as one small piece in a similar vein from 'True Comics' #75. A lot of fun stuff awaits -- right after the jump! Let's jump right in with issue # 3 of Juke Box, from July 1948, and some heroic adventure action featuring Count Basie! The art is by the justly-famed Jimmy Thompson. ..."
WFMU

African Girl - Sugar Minott (1981)

"Lincoln Barrington 'Sugar' Minott was born in 1956 in Kingston, Jamaica and first entered the music business as a member of a harmony trio called The African Brothers with Tony Tuff and Derrick Howard. ... But Minott's artistry consisted in breaking down barriers and transcending the limitations of musical genres and a track like 'African Girl' on the eponymous LP did just that. Indeed, that song could be said to be a cultural or roots track from the point of view of lyrics, but the musical backing certainly places it in the lovers rock or early dancehall category. ..."
Perfect Sound Forever
YouTube: African Girl (Full Album), Herbman hustling & Version, Sugar Minott & Ranking Dread - Come Sister Come & Careless Ethiopians

2010 June: Sugar Minott, 2012 September: No vacancy + dub Version

La La La Human Steps: Amelia

"... Directed and choreographed by [Edouard] Locke in 2002, Amelia, is a beautiful piece of dance on film that won awards and critical acclaim at numerous festivals when it came out. Amelia features a hypnotic, original, minimalist score written by David Lang for violin, cello, piano and voice, and lyrics from five of Lou Reed’s most famous works that he created in the 60s for the Velvet Underground. It is beautifully shot from multiple angles, some dizzying and swooping, in a space that was tailor-made for the film itself. The shadows and lighting in tandem with the shots and the movement add layers of beauty to the stark visuals. ..."
Cultural Weekly
Dance Camera West
UbuWeb: Amelia (Video)

2008 July: La La La Human Steps, 2010 May: David Bowie - "Look Back In Anger", 2010 September: Mondo Beyondo

The Black Film Canon - The 50 greatest movies by black directors.

Shaft, 1971
"#OscarsSoWhite wasn’t — isn’t — only about a stuffy institution failing to recognize work by people of color. Pushing the industry to allow black filmmakers and actors to tell more substantial stories through high-profile work is a crucial step toward remedying the systematic issues at the heart of this controversy. But it’s not the only step. To change Hollywood, it’s important not only to look forward but to look back. ... It’s time to fight the canons that be. Slate asked more than 20 prominent filmmakers, critics, and scholars — including Ava DuVernay, Robert Townsend, Charles Burnett, Gina Prince-Bythewood, Wesley Morris, and Henry Louis Gates Jr. — for their favorite movies by filmmakers of color and used their picks to shape our list of the 50 greatest films by black directors. ..."
Slate (Video)
The Black Film Canon: Slate picks 50 of the greatest films by black directors (Video)

New Video of James Schuyler’s Legendary Debut Reading in 1988

"A rare video of James Schuyler reading his poems has just surfaced on YouTube, thanks to Raymond Foye, executor of Schuyler’s estate, who posted the video several days ago. Since there is virtually no extant video footage of Schuyler that I know of, this would be a big deal no matter what, but the fact that it is a recording of this particular event — a now-legendary reading Schuyler gave at the Dia Art Foundation in New York in 1988 — makes it even more special and exciting.* This reading is particularly famous because it was on November 15, 1988 that Schuyler, at 65, finally gave his first poetry reading. Reclusive, plagued by intermittent bouts of severe mental illness, painfully shy, Schuyler had never before read his work in public, even though he’d been publishing since the 1950s. ..."
Locus Solus: The New York School of Poets (Video)
YouTube: James Schuyler Reading at DIA 1988 49:19

2008 January: James Schuyler, 2009 October: James Schuyler: Six New Recordings Added, 2011 March: Broadway: A Poets and Painters Anthology, 2011 December: An Anthology of New York Poets, 2012 July: A Schuyler of urgent concern, 2013 July: In Fairfield Porter / James Schuyler country: Penobscot Bay, Maine, 2014 November: Just the Thing: Selected Letters of James Schuyler 1951-1991, 2015 October: The Morning of the Poem (1980).

Muhammad Ali (1942 - 2016)

"Film footage of Muhammad Ali is used to sell everything from soft drinks to cars. The image we are spoon-fed is the improbably charismatic boxer, dancing in the ring and shouting 'I am the greatest.'
The present Muhammad Ali is also a very public figure, despite his near total inability to move or speak. His voice has been silenced by both his years of boxing and Parkinson’s disease. This Ali has been embraced by the establishment as a walking saint. In 1996, Ali was sent with his trembling hands to light the Olympic Torch in Atlanta. In 2002, he 'agreed to star in a Hollywood-produced advertising campaign, designed to explain America and the war in Afghanistan to the Muslim world.' Ali has been absorbed by the establishment as a legend — a harmless icon. ..."
Jacobin: The Hidden History of Muhammad Ali
W - Muhammad Ali
NY Times: President Obama’s Statement on Muhammad Ali (More Muhammad Ali Coverage)
The Atlantic: Remembering Muhammad Ali, the Greatest of All Time
NPR (Video)
NYPL: 5 Muhammad Ali Movies to Remember the Legend
NBC (Video)
YouTube: Top 10 Muhammad Ali Best Knockouts, Amazing Speed

Electric Paris

John Singer Sargent, In the Luxembourg Gardens, 1879
"Paris had been known as the City of Light long before the widespread use of gaslight and electricity. The name arose during the Enlightenment, when philosophers made Paris a center of ideas and of metaphorical illumination. By the mid-nineteenth century, the epithet became associated with the city’s adoption of artificial lighting: in the 1840s and 1850s, gas lamps were first installed, while electric versions began to proliferate by the end of the 1870s. Even as rivals, including Berlin, London, New York, and Chicago, increased the quantity of light in their rapidly electrified cities, Paris managed to maintain its reputation because of the beauty of its illuminations. Light remained and remains to this day a key signature of the French capital. ..."
Bruce Museum (Video)
NY Times: The City of Lights, When It Was First Lighted
Art New England

Turner’s Whaling Pictures

"This focus exhibition is the first to unite the series of four whaling scenes made by the British landscapist Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775–1851) near the end of his career. The quartet of paintings—comprising The Met's Whalers and its three companions in the Tate, London—were among the last seascapes exhibited by Turner, for whom marine subjects were a creative mainstay. Shown in pairs at the Royal Academy in London in 1845 and 1846, the whaling canvases confounded critics with their 'tumultuous surges' of brushwork and color, which threatened to obscure the motif, yet the pictures earned admiration for the brilliance and vitality of their overall effects. ..."
The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
NY Times: In Turner Paintings at the Met, the Bloody Business of Whaling

2014 May: Ruin Lust, 2014 September: The EY Exhibition: Late Turner – Painting Set Free

In France, a Political Football

A protester faces police with a torch and a bouquet of flowers in Lyon, 26
"The French Socialist government is facing increasing unrest over its proposed labor reforms, which may disrupt the Euro 2016 soccer championship. In late March, the Nuit debout movement resurrected Occupy-style assembly tactics in response to the proposed reforms. In May the government attempted to use Article 49.3 to bypass parliament and force through the legislation. Now French rail workers are on strike and potential strikes by other unions loom, possibly threatening the Euro 2016 soccer championship. Strikes by power plant operators are causing blackouts. At one point, the only paper appearing in France was the left-wing L’Humanité due to action by the printers. Behind the strikes is France's leading militant union, the CGT. In other news, the Louvre is closing due to recent flooding."
Metafilter

Nothing Here Now But The Recordings - William Burroughs (1981)

"It is the voice you notice first of all. It has the quality of one speaking beyond the grave, a croak that is authoritative and ravaged in equal measure. It is the voice that creaks out from a dark alley and nests under the skin. ... Nothing Here Now But The Recordings was originally compiled by Genesis P-Orridge and 'Sleazy' Peter Christopherson of Throbbing Gristle in 1980 from Burroughs' personal archive, and is re-released by Dais Records. As a collection of Burroughs' tape experiments, the tracks vary considerably in fidelity and length. Some are bursts of language and noise, shaped by chance operation. ..."
The Quietus
DAIS
Discogs
RealityStudio
Nothing Here Now But The Recordings: Listening to William Burroughs (Video)
UbuWeb: Nothing Here Now But The Recordings (Video)
YouTube: In Dub (Selected by Dub Spencer & Trance Hill - 2014)

2009 May: Cut-up technique - 1, 2010 March: Cut-up technique, 2010 December: The Evolution of the Cut-Up Technique in My Own Mag, 2012 August: The Nova Trilogy, 2014 February: William Burroughs at 100, 2014 September: The Ticket That Exploded, 2014 November: What Is Schizo-Culture? A Classic Conversation with William S. Burroughs, 2015 June: The Electronic Revolution (1971), 2015 August: Cut-Ups: William S. Burroughs 1914 – 2014, 2015 December: Destroy All Rational Thought, 2016 January: Commissioner of Sewers: A 1991 Profile of Beat Writer William S. Burroughs.

Archie Shepp - The Magic of Ju-Ju (1967)

"On this 1967 Impulse release, tenor saxophonist Archie Shepp unleashed his 18-minute tour de force 'The Magic of Ju-Ju,' combining free jazz tenor with steady frenetic African drumming. Shepp's emotional and fiery tenor takes off immediately, gradually morphing with the five percussionists -- Beaver Harris, Norman Connor, Ed Blackwell, Frank Charles, and Dennis Charles -- who perform on instruments including rhythm logs and talking drums. Shepp never loses the initial energy, moving forward like a man possessed as the drumming simultaneously builds into a fury. Upon the final three minutes, the trumpets of Martin Banks and Michael Zwerin make an abrupt brief appearance, apparently to ground the piece to a halt. This is one of Shepp's most chaotic yet rhythmically hypnotic pieces. ..."
allmusic (Video)
W - The Magic of Ju-Ju
LondonJazzCollector
Discogs
YouTube: The Magic of Ju-Ju (Full Album)

2015 March: Attica Blues (1972)

The Journey from Syria, Part One

"For more about Aboud Shalhoub’s family and the story behind “The Journey,” read an interview with the documentary’s director, Matthew Cassel. One afternoon last April, a Syrian jeweller named Aboud Shalhoub sat in a messy apartment in Istanbul, wrapping his legs in plastic film. For two and a half years, Shalhoub had tried to build a life in Turkey, away from the perils of wartime Damascus, where his wife, Christine, and their two young children would remain until he could afford to relocate them. As Shalhoub learned Turkish and took on several jobs, his children came to know him mostly through Skype calls. Finally, he decided that his best option was to travel to Europe as a refugee, apply for asylum, and submit paperwork for family reunification. If all went according to plan, his new country could facilitate travel out of Syria for Christine and the children. ..."
New Yorker (Video)

Dondestan (Revisited) - Robert Wyatt (1998)

"The original issue of Dondestan, one of Robert Wyatt's later, signature recordings, ran over budget, prompting him to release the album without an authoritative final mix. Wyatt, unlike many of the artists of his era, has often been in the unenviable position of having the original unmixed tapes of his records either disappear or get erased. Dondestan was the lone exception and he took full advantage. ... When this project was first announced, many of Wyatt's faithful were apprehensive, this writer included -- after all, why tamper with a masterpiece? There was no need for concern. The result made a great work of art a sublime one."
allmusic (Video)
Wikipedia
Domino
YouTube: Interview (Part One of Two), (Part Two of Two)
YouTube: Left on Man - Live BBC (2006)
YouTube: Dondestan Revisited (Full)

2010 November: Robert Wyatt, 2011 October: Sea Song, 2012 October: Comicopera, 2013 March: The Last Nightingale, 2013 September: Solar Flares Burn for You (2003), 2014 March: Cuckooland (2003), 2014 October: Robert Wyatt Story (BBC Four, 2001), 2014 December: Different Every Time (2014), 2016 March: Interviews (2014).

No gentle saint

"Roberto Clemente never got the chance to be old school. He died too young, at age 38, so long ago now that he has been gone longer than he was with us. That he is still remembered and revered more than four decades after his passing is a testament to the way he lived, with passion and pride, and the way he died, in a plane crash, while delivering humanitarian aid to earthquake-ravaged Nicaragua on Dec. 31, 1972. ... But Clemente was no gentle saint, and the mythologizing of him, while done with good intentions, smooths over the jagged reality of his life and times and softens the important issues that he so fiercely raised during the middle of the 20th century and that remain relevant today, both in baseball and American society. ..."
The Undefeated

Enthralled by Sicily, Again - Francine Prose

"On the subject of travel, my father used to say: 'You can’t go back. Avoid the places you loved when you were young, because they’ll have changed, and you’ll be disappointed.' Occasionally my husband agrees, 'That’s right, you can’t go back.' But does that mean that the cities and countries where we were happiest and most enchanted must forever be crossed off the list of dreamed-of destinations? Can’t some places remain unspoiled (or possibly even improve)? And, at the very least, isn’t it interesting to see how different a place looks to us at various points in our lives? This spring, I decided to find the answer to some of these questions by revisiting Sicily, one of my favorite places on earth. ..."
NY Times (Slide Show)
W - Sicily
Telegraph - A perfect holiday in Sicily: our expert's ultimate two-week itinerary
YouTube: The Best of Sicily

How Jefferson Airplane’s Grace Slick Wrote ‘White Rabbit’

"When Grace Slick wrote 'White Rabbit' in late 1965, she never imagined the song would pave the way for psychedelic rock and inspire several generations of lead female rock singers, including Pink, who covers it in the new film 'Alice Through the Looking Glass.' Released originally by Jefferson Airplane in February 1967 on its 'Surrealistic Pillow' album and then as a single that June, 'White Rabbit' peaked at No. 8 on Billboard’s pop chart. The brooding bolero has been interpreted by dozens of rock and jazz artists and was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1998. Earlier this year, Ms. Slick, 76, spoke about the song she composed on a red piano, and her trippy lyrics based on 'Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.' ..."
WSJ (Video)
W - "White Rabbit"
A Shroud of Thoughts

2012 March: "The House at Pooneil"

Clockers - Spike Lee (1995)

Wikipedia - "Clockers is a 1995 American crime drama film directed by Spike Lee. It is an adaptation of the eponymous 1992 novel by Richard Price, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Lee. The film stars Harvey Keitel, John Turturro, Delroy Lindo, and Mekhi Phifer in his debut film role. Set in New York City, Clockers tells the story of Strike (Phifer), a street-level drug dealer who becomes entangled in a murder investigation. In a Brooklyn housing project, a group of clockers — street-level drug dealers — sell drugs for Rodney Little (Delroy Lindo), a local drug lord. Rodney tells Ronald 'Strike' Dunham (Mekhi Phifer), one of his lead clockers, that another dealer, Darryl Adams (Steve White), is stealing from him and 'got to be got', implying that he wants Strike to kill Darryl. ..."
Wikipedia
W - Clockers (novel)
Roger Ebert
NY Times: In a Hell of Drugs and Despair
YouTube: Clockers - Trailer, CHILDREN OF THE GHETTO

2009 January: Spike Lee, 2014 June: Do the Right Thing (1989)