MILLENNIUM: Lower Manhattan in the 1990s

"The last decade of the 20th century in New York City was not a simple time. The end of a millennium – a thousand-year marker – and the beginning of the 2000s prompted both anxiety and optimism, posing questions about what to retain from the past and how to move into the future. No place in the mid-1990s was more conflicted about these prospects or more ripe for reinvention than lower Manhattan – especially the historic Financial District. Wall Street was losing banks to mergers and relocations. Grand skyscrapers of the 1910s and ‘20s were becoming technologically obsolete and sliding down-market. The lasting effect of the 1987 stock market crash, followed by the savings-and-loan scandals, caused a real estate recession that hit Downtown harder than other districts. Vacancy rates for office buildings topped 28 percent. New thinking and policies were necessary. ..."
MILLENNIUM: Lower Manhattan in the 1990s
NY Times: When Wall Street Was Unoccupied

Heaven is a Playground

Julius Erving - Dr. J.
"This past weekend gave us the All-Star game festivities as the NBA season reaches its midpoint (all flows through LeBron). And it just so happens, Basketball: Great Writing About America’s Game, the fantastic new anthology from the esteemed Library of America is set to drop in a few weeks. Edited by Sports Illustrated’s elegant, longtime hoops scribe, Alex Wolff, the collection features three sparkling profiles from our pages, on Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Larry Bird and Julius Erving, aka, Dr. J. ... Or the kind of pick-up games that are so precisely evoked in 'Doc’s Story,' the terse short story by John Edgar Wideman, who, before becoming a novelist, played college ball against the likes of 'Dollar' Bill Bradley. Street ball (Hello, Lloyd Daniels) is a good place to return...."
Esquire

2011 June: American Basketball Association, 2012 July: Doin’ It In The Park: Pick-Up Basketball, NYC, 2012 November: Your Guide to the Brooklyn Nets, 2013 March: March Madness 2013, 2013 October: Rucker Park, 2014 January: History of the high five, 2015 February: Dean Smith (February 28, 1931 – February 7, 2015), 2015 June: Basketball’s Obtuse Triangle, 2015 September: Joint Ventures: How sneakers became high fashion and big business, 2015 October: Loose Balls - Terry Pluto (2007), 2015 November: The Sounds of Memphis, 2015 December: Welcome to Smarter Basketball, 2015 December: New York, New York: Julius Erving, the Nets-Knicks Feud, and America’s Bicentennial, 2016 January: The Last Shot: City Streets, Basketball Dreams (1994), 2016 January: A Long Hardwood Journey, 2016 March: American Hustle - Alexandra Starr, 2016 November: 2016–17 College Basketball, 2017 November: 2017-18 College Basketball, 2017 March: N.C.A.A. Bracket Predictions: Who the Tournament Experts Pick, 2017 June: The Rise and Fall of the High-Top Sneaker, 2018 January: Chaos Is This College Basketball Season’s Only Constant

Where We Are: Selections from the Whitney’s Collection, 1900–1960

Charles Demuth (1883‑1935), Buildings, Lancaster, 1930.
"Focusing on works made from 1900 to 1960, Where We Are traces how artists have approached the relationships, institutions, and activities that shape our lives. Drawn entirely from the Whitney’s holdings, the exhibition is organized around five themes: family and community, work, home, the spiritual, and the nation. During the six decades covered here, the United States experienced war and peace, economic collapse and recovery, and social discord and progress. American artists responded in complex and diverse ways, and a central aim of the exhibition is to honor each artist’s efforts to create her or his own vision of American life. The artists and their works suggest that our sense of self is composed of our responsibilities, places, and beliefs. Where We Are, as well as each of its sections, is titled after a phrase in W. H. Auden’s poem 'September 1, 1939.' ..."
Whitney

PHOTOS: Since Standing Rock, 56 Bills Have Been Introduced in 30 States to Restrict Protests

February 23, 2017: Law-enforcement officers point their weapons at two water protectors praying near the Sacred Fire of the main resistance camp of the Dakota Access Pipeline protests. Both men were arrested, along with the photographer, shortly after this image was taken.
"In February 23 of last year, a day when the frozen ground had started to turn to mud, law-enforcement officers rolled into the Oceti Sakowin camp near the Standing Rock Sioux reservation in North Dakota. Donald Trump had been inaugurated a month earlier, and the new president quickly reversed an Obama administration decision to deny Energy Transfer Partners a permit to finish construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline, a $3.78 billion project running directly under the Missouri River. The water protectors, as protesters called themselves, had been fighting the pipeline since the spring of 2016, concerned that the proposed route cut through ancestral land of spiritual significance, and that a pipeline leak could contaminate the primary water supply to the reservation. ... Photojournalist Tracie Williams, on assignment for the National Press Photographers’ Association, captured some of what happened next. ..."
The Nation

2011 July: Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee - Dee Brown, 2012 September: The Ghost Dance, 2016 September: A History and Future of Resistance, 2016 November: Dakota Access Pipeline protests, 2016 December: Police Violence Against Native Americans Goes Far Beyond Standing Rock, 2016 December: Dakota Protesters Say Belle Fourche Oil Spill 'Validates Struggle', 2017 January: A Murky Legal Mess at Standing Rock, 2017 January: Trump's Move On Keystone XL, Dakota Access Outrages Activists, 2017 February: Army veterans return to Standing Rock to form a human shield against police, 2017 February: Standing Rock is burning – but our resistance isn't over, 2017 March: Dakota Access pipeline could open next week after activists face final court loss, 2017 April: The Conflicts Along 1,172 Miles of the Dakota Access Pipeline, 2017 May: 'Those are our Eiffel Towers, our pyramids': Why Standing Rock is about much more than oil, 2017 June: Dakota pipeline protesters won a small victory in court. We must fight on

Eric Clapton - 461 Ocean Boulevard (1974)

Wikipedia - "461 Ocean Boulevard is a 1974 solo album by Eric Clapton that marked his return to recording after recovering from a three-year addiction to heroin. The album was released in late July 1974 for RSO Records, shortly after the record company released the hit single 'I Shot the Sheriff' in early July the same year. ... The album title refers to the address on Ocean Boulevard where Clapton lived while recording the album. The street address of the house was changed after the album's release due to fans flocking to the property. The house has long since been rebuilt and the street address restored. After overcoming his heroin addiction, Clapton realized that he wasted three years of his life, stating he had not done anything other than watch television and get out of shape. When Clapton sought help working on a farm, he began to listen to a lot of new music and old blues records he had brought with him and started to play again, even writing whole songs out of simple ideas. ..."
Wikipedia
Rolling Stone
amazon, iTunes
YouTube: Eric Clapton "461 Ocean Boulevard" - Full Album 11 videos

Oonops Drops – Volume 1 – Brooklyn Radio

"‘Oonops Drops’ turns five this year on Brooklyn Radio and Oonops is very proud to present you an exclusive mixtape here on our station and Mixcloud with all the tracks of his upcoming compilation on Agogo Records in the end of February 2018. It will get a proper double vinyl, cd and digital release with acts from around the globe like Mayer Hawthorne, Suff Daddy, DJ Cam Quartet, Guts, Prince Fatty, Nostalgia 77, Cro-Magnon, Pat Van Dyke, Figub Brazlevic, Shawn Lee, Ohmega Watts, ShinSight Trio, Slakah The Beatchild, Nautilus, Fleur Earth, Green Street, Mankoora and Indigo Jam Unit. ... For the cover he joined forces with San Francisco based oil paintress Lindsey Kustusch who cherishes the mood of this work and its spirit. Enjoy this musical trip from dub, soul, funk, instrumentals, hip hop and jazz! And visit your host Oonops on Mixcloud and Facebook."
Brooklyn Radio (Audio)

Trump’s Silence Leaves Struggle Against Russia Without Leader

President Trump in West Palm Beach, Fla., on Friday. Mr. Trump has made little, if any public, effort to rally the nation to confront Moscow for its electoral intrusion or to defend democratic institutions against continued disruption.
"After more than a dozen Russians and three companies were indicted on Friday for interfering in the 2016 elections, President Trump’s first reaction was to claim personal vindication: 'The Trump campaign did nothing wrong — no collusion!' he wrote on Twitter. He voiced no concern that a foreign power had been trying for nearly four years to upend American democracy, much less resolve to stop it from continuing to do so this year. The indictment secured by the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, underscored the broader conclusion by the American government that Russia is engaged in a virtual war against the United States through 21st-century tools of disinformation and propaganda, a conclusion shared by the president’s own senior advisers and intelligence chiefs. But it is a war being fought on the American side without a commander in chief. ..."
NY Times
NY Times: How Russian Bots Invade Our Elections (Video)
NY Times: The Troll Farm: What We Know About 13 Russians Indicted by the U.S.
NY Times: To Stir Discord in 2016, Russians Turned Most Often to Facebook
Washington Post: Doubting the intelligence, Trump pursues Putin and leaves a Russian threat unchecked (Video) Dec. 2017

The Berlin Stories - Christopher Isherwood (1945)

"The Berlin Stories is a semi-autobiographical account of Christopher Isherwood’s life in Berlin before the Second World War. Set in 1931, the English-born author chronicles his misadventures with the city’s most interesting characters. The novel is essentially divided into ‘Mr. Norris Changes Trains’ and ‘Goodbye to Berlin’. With both stories barely skimming 200 pages, the tales were combined in 1946 to become The Berlin Stories. In ‘Mr. Norris Changes Trains’, Isherwood goes by his alias William Bradshaw (Derived by his full name, Christopher William Bradshaw Isherwood). The novel opens with young William Bradshaw encountering with an nervous man named Arthur Norris, on a train from Holland to Berlin. Noticing Norris is a fellow Englishman, Bradshaw strikes up a conversation with the stranger. Norris’s hesitation reaches it’s climax when German police ask to see his passport. Bradshaw appeases the officer and helps to calm Norris down without making a scene. Originally intrigued by Norris’s mysterious nature (and overly aristocratic English demeanor) the two soon develop a friendship. ..."
Living with Literature
W - The Berlin Stories
I Could Show You Memories To Rival Berlin in the Thirties: Christopher Isherwood and The Berlin Stories
BBC: Berlin through the eyes of Christopher Isherwood
amazon

In Bb 2.0 - Darren Solomon

"Producer Darren Solomon has harnessed the power of YouTube and musical collaborators to create a video-led symphony where you can be the conductor. [partner id='wireduk'] In Bb 2.0 (also written as B flat) is an online music and spoken-word project that allows viewers to produce music by playing 20 YouTube videos of different musicians making melodies in the key of B flat. The videos, which are between one and two minutes long each, have been compiled by Solomon after volunteers answered his open call on website In Bb – an earlier version of the project. ..."
WIRED - In Bb 2.0: The Symphony of 20 Simultaneous YouTube Music Videos
In Bb 2.0 (Video)
In Bb 2.0 - FAQ

Thomas Cole's Journey: Atlantic Crossings

The Oxbow (1836)
"Celebrated as one of America's preeminent landscape painters, Thomas Cole (1801–1848) was born in northern England at the start of the Industrial Revolution, immigrated to the United States in his youth, and traveled extensively throughout England and Italy as a young artist. He returned to America to create some of his most ambitious works and inspire a new generation of American painters. This exhibition examines for the first time the artist's career in relation to his European roots and travels, establishing Cole as a major figure in 19th-century landscape art within a global context. Thomas Cole's Journey marks the 200th anniversary of Cole's first Atlantic crossing, when he emigrated from England to the United States in 1818, and examines in depth Cole's return journey to England in 1829–31 and his travels in Italy in 1831–32, revealing the development of his artistic processes. ..."
Met Museum (Video)
WSJ: ‘Thomas Cole’s Journey: Atlantic Crossings’ Review: Hudson River School Headmaster
Met Museum: Thomas Cole's Journey: Atlantic Crossings

Tara Lipinski and Johnny Weir aren’t mean, but ‘truth can be hard to hear’

"NBC’s primetime figure skating broadcasts from the PyeongChang Games provide a steady dose of jumps, spins and America’s most talked-about platonic couple: analysts Tara Lipinski and Johnny Weir. The duo exploded onto the scene four years ago as commentators on NBC Sports Network during the Sochi Games. Their wardrobe, flair and candor proved so popular that the network invited them back for the Summer Olympics. That makes PyeongChang their third Games, and their first on NBC’s biggest stage. Lipinski, Weir and Terry Gannon (whom they call their 'partner in crime') almost immediately were part of some memorable calls at this year’s Games. Think of their joyful broadcast of American Mirai Nagasu’s historic triple axel, as the United States won bronze in the team event. Or their bluntness when gold medal hopeful Nathan Chen faltered. ..."
Washington Post (Video)
NY Times: Step Inside Johnny Weir’s Hotel Room at the Olympics
Tara Lipinski Hasn’t Lost Her Edge (Video)
W - Johnny Weir
W - Tara Lipinski
Pennsylvanians on Olympic ice: Who is Johnny Weir? (Video)

Carina Driscoll - Mayor: Burlington, Vermont - Progressives Party

"I am proud to launch my campaign for Mayor of Burlington. This election is about bringing people together. Through this campaign, and then as Mayor if elected, I will work to bring Burlington to again be that vibrant, forward-thinking city where we are all so proud to live. It is time to bring our actions in Burlington back into line with our community values. Burlingtonians of all walks of life, political parties, and throughout the city yearn for the opportunity to engage the issues that impact their lives and their community. It is time to bring the people back to the table. In this period of rapid development of our city, many community assets hang in the balance. Whether we are talking about Memorial Auditorium, the Moran Plant, our public waterfront, or other city-owned property throughout Burlington, the people have the right to determine what we do with them. ..."
Carina for Mayor
VT Digger: Burlington Progressives endorse Driscoll in mayoral race
Seven Days: A Burlington City Employees Union Endorses Driscoll for Mayor
Seven Days: Sanders Organization 'Our Revolution' Endorses Driscoll for Burlington Mayor

Jazz: The African Sound - Chris McGregor and the Castle Lager Big Band (1963)

"One of the most important African records of all time gets its first ever worldwide release on Jazzman! Chris McGregor's Jazz – The African Sound is a lost global jazz classic, and a true holy grail for collectors of jazz and world-jazz. A cornerstone of South Africa's illustrious jazz history, it has been out of print since before the end of apartheid. Never before released outside of the country, this painstakingly restored reissue is the long-delayed first chance to hear Chris McGregor's debut recording as leader. As well as fully restored audio, the package features unpublished photographs by Basil Breakey and new sleeve-notes by author Francis Gooding. Ten years before the Brotherhood of Breath blew the cobwebs out of British jazz, Chris McGregor had already recorded as leader with a big band comprised of South Africa's leading jazz lights. Put together in 1963, the Castle Lager Big Band was a multi-racial group, a risky endeavour in apartheid South Africa. ..."
Kudos Records (Audio)
flatinternational
W - Chris McGregor
Discogs
amazon, iTunes
YouTube: Switch, Kippie, Eclipse at Dawn, I Remember Billy

A History of the United American Socialist Republics

"... I decided to write an atlas. The People's Socialist Atlas is an atlas made from the perspective of a communist United States that underwent a revolution in the 1920's. The PoD of the atlas is that there was a larger and more successful Paris Commune, which lead to increased paranoia around the world. It's a full book. It's over 200 pages, and over 50,000 words. I began writing it in 2016 with the intention that it would be done by the beginning of 2017. It didn't. It took me up until today to finally finish this project. ... There are thirteen maps in the atlas. Four I'm extremely proud of, and all took me hours upon hours to make. That's why I'm posting the atlas here. In each post, there should be more than one map, which I think qualifies it to belong in this thread. The rest of the writing should speak for itself. Today, I'll be posting pages 1 to 74 of the Atlas. That's the first half of the "American History" section, and includes maps of the American Revolution and the United American Socialist Republics. CLICK ON THE IMAGE BELOW TO CHECK OUT ALL THE PAGES, or click here. ..."
alternatehistory
Google - People's Socialist Atlas
[PDF] A History of the United American Socialist Republics

Twin Peaks: The Return, or What Isn’t Cinema?

"1: Where You Find It. Any port in a storm. In 2017, faced with the most ignominious slate of theatrical releases in memory, a few of us belonging to the small cabal of film world types who engage in the curious ritual of year-end listmaking, decided to recruit a television show to the ranks of cinema, or at least tried to. Enough agreed that the resurrected 2017 season of Twin Peaks, also known as Twin Peaks: The Return, was the artistic apotheosis of one of the greatest living filmmakers, David Lynch, who directed and cowrote every episode, to place it on the top tens of both Sight & Sound and Cahiers du cinéma, cinephile publications which allowed it in the running. Elsewhere, its non-eligibility revived a periodic kerfuffle over whether a work made for and aired on 'television,' much less a serialized one, could ever take its place among the year’s best 'films.' ..."
Reverse Shot - (Part One), (Part Two), (Part Three), (Part Four)

2008 September: Twin Peaks, 2010 March: Twin Peaks: How Laura Palmer's death marked the rebirth of TV drama, 2011 October: Twin Peaks: The Last Days, 2014 October: Welcome to Twin Peaks, 2015 June: David Lynch: ‘I’ve always loved Laura Palmer’, 2015 July: Twin Peaks Maps, 2016 May: Hear the Music of David Lynch’s Twin Peaks Played..., September: Twin Peaks Tarot Cards For The Magician Who Longs To See Through The Darkness Of Future Past, 2014 September: David Lynch: The Unified Field, 2014 December: David Lynch’s Bad Thoughts - J. Hoberman, 2015 March: Lumière and Company (1995), 2015 April: David Lynch Creates a Very Surreal Plug for Transcendental Meditation, 2015 December: What Is “Lynchian”?, 2017 March: Anatomy of a Fascinating Disaster: Fire Walk With Me, 2017 April: Trading Card Set of the Week – Twin Peaks (Star Pics, 1991), 2017 April: Your Complete Guide to Rewatching "Twin Peaks"

Sire Records

Wikipedia - "Sire Records is an American record label that is owned by Warner Music Group and distributed by Warner Bros. Records. ... In the mid-1970s, Sire transformed itself into a successful independent record label and went on to sign artists from the burgeoning punk rock and new wave scenes, including the Ramones, the Dead Boys, the Undertones and Talking Heads. Sire returned to major-label distribution in 1977 with a new arrangement with Warner Bros. Records, and the next year, Warner acquired Sire outright. Over the next four years, Sire achieved mainstream status after launching the careers of the Pretenders and Madonna (its biggest act), and introduced such acts as Soft Cell, the Cure, Depeche Mode, The Smiths, and Echo & the Bunnymen to North America. During the late 1980s and early 1990s, the label had continued success with a wide-ranging roster that included Ministry, k.d. lang, Ice-T, Seal, and Tommy Page, and were early champions of Underworld. ..."
Wikipedia
The Sire Records Story
Tidal: Sire Records: 50 Greatest Singles (Audio)

Who Has the Most Riding on the Champions League?

"Finally, some uncertainty! Although the Premier League, Bundesliga, La Liga, and Ligue 1 winners have essentially already been decided—Manchester City, Bayern Munich, Barcelona, and PSG all have at least seven-point domestic leads—this year’s stacked Champions League field promises to tell us something we don’t already know. Who has the most riding on the knockout stages? The guys from Ringer FC each picked one player and one team. ..."
The Ringer

Paris Movie Walks: Ten Guided Tours Through the City of Lights! Camera! Action! (2009)

"From Truffaut and Godard to Brando and Hepburn, Paris has been a magnet for filmmakers and movie stars alike, whose careers don’t seem complete unless they’ve made at least one film in the world’s most romantic location. Now see it from a whole new angle through the lenses of famous directors. Four walks take you past all of Paris’ famous sites while telling which stars walked these same streets before you and where they paused to kiss or kill. Three explore hidden nooks that tourists often overlook, and three offer a taste of the 'Old Paris' of 30s and 40s classics. Along the way, the author provides commentary to enrich your appreciation of what you’re seeing as you sip wine at sidewalk cafes. Maps make it easy to follow along and a complete index of films guides you to your favorite flicks. ..."
Paris Movie Walks
Paris Movie Walks: Sponsored posts
amazon

Msafiri Zawose - Uhamiaji (2017)

"Tanzania's Msafri Zawose has been one of the biggest slept-on musical forces from the region. That's about to change with the imminent arrival of a new album that will redefne the boundaries of gogo music. The Wagogo people are Msafri's traditonally nomadic tribe from the center of the Tanzania, known for their musicality and made famous by Hukwe Zawose - Msafri's father, who toured the world as a part of Peter Gabriel's Real World roster in the 80s and 90s. The album has been produced in collaboraton with Sam Jones from SoundThread, whose recent works with Orlando Julius and remixes for Mugwisa Internatonal and Sarabi have been rapturously received. The tracks remain profoundly 'gogo' with traditonal instruments and singing, but are infused with an organic electronic aesthetc. This is an afro-futurist journey that takes in dub, balearic, ambient and electronic vibratons alongside Zawose's hypnotc playing and emotve, plaintve vocals."
deejay (Audio)
Discogs
Soundway Records
amazon, iTunes
YouTube: Uhamiaji 13 videos

A Visual Tour of 35 Literary Bars and Cafés from Around the World

Café Tortoni, Buenos Aires, Argentina
"In our habitual fantasies, writers do nothing but sit at small café tables, sometimes meeting with their friends, other times gazing wistfully into a pint or swirling an espresso before they scribble down their latest brilliant thought. It may have worked for Hemingway, but I’m here to tell you: that’s not usually what writing looks like. But hey, it’s Friday. So what better time to indulge our daydreams and salivate over a few of the bars and cafés that famous writers frequented in days of yore? I mean, writerly fantasies aside, I wouldn’t mind reading for a while in any one of these. Of course, this is nowhere near a complete list of every place a famous writer ever drank—not least because in the interest of avoiding the New York/Paris/Dublin trap, I’ve limited the choices to one per city—so feel free to add on to the list. Now, without any further ado: 35 literary watering holes in 35 cities. Which one would you visit? ..."
LitHub

New Museum in Southern France Will House More Than a Thousand Works by Pablo Picasso

The future site of Aix-en-Provence’s Jacqueline and Pablo Picasso Museum
"Most artists would be honored to have one museum dedicated to their work. But when you’re Pablo Picasso you have several, including museums in Barcelona, Malaga, Paris, and southern France. Now, reports Gareth Harris at the Art Newspaper, the artist’s stepdaughter is hoping to add a new entry, and has recently purchased a convent in Aix-En-Provence to house a museum with the largest collection of Picasso works yet. ... Janie Cohen, a Picasso expert and the director of the Fleming Museum of Art at the University of Vermont, predicts that the new space will be important for Picasso scholarship. 'Most of the works have been neither previously exhibited nor published,' she tells Harris. 'These are works that remained with the artist throughout his life. With the overview offered by the Musée Picasso in Paris, it strikes me as a terrific addition to have an important and overarching collection in southern France.' ..."
Smithsonian
New Picasso Museum Will Boast World’s Largest Collection of His Works

2016 March: The Battle for Picasso’s Multi-Billion-Dollar Empire

Northern Soul: An Oral History

Frank Wilson - Do I Love You (Indeed I Do)
"Between the blossoming of the hippy movement in the late ’60s and the decimation of British industrial heartlands in the ’70s, the underground club culture of London’s Mod scene snaked its way 'Up North' to a generation who were too tough for flower power, but still craved respite from the daily grind. In defiance of the chart music and the popular press of the day, a radical (and often elitist) youth subculture called Northern Soul saw white working class kids travel hundreds of miles across the United Kingdom to squeeze into specialist club nights, clapping, stomping and high-kicking to a sound that’s since become embedded in the British cultural consciousness and praised as the older brother of the early rave scene. Although nearly everything about Northern Soul was niche, it was also transformative. Bodies writhed inside amphetamine-fuelled takeovers of the dancehalls and basements of their parents’ Saturday night 'turns.' ..." 
Red Bull Music Academy Daily (Video)

2012 October: Northern Soul, 2012 December: The obsession that is Northern Soul, 2013 November: Poor-Man's Speed: Coming of Age in Wigan's Anarchic Northern Soul Scene, 2014 May: Northern Soul: Keeping The Faith - The Culture Show, 2014 September: Sam Dees - Lonely for You Baby, 2016 May: Moses Smith - Girl Across The Street (1968)

Tugboat Jess Pulls Her Weight

The waters in and around New York Harbor that the tugboat works.
"On the icy deck of the Kings Point, a 94-foot tug based in New York Harbor, Jess Yeomans picked up a thick, heavy rope and flung it with the skill of a rodeo cowboy onto a steel post about 10 feet away, and then just as deftly flipped it free again. As a deckhand on a tugboat, being skilled with lines as thick as baseball bats is obligatory, and it is something that is picked up from other seamen. 'These are traditions that are passed down,' said Ms. Yeomans, who is aware of another tugboat tradition: It is mostly men who work on them. Her tasks include hustling around the deck and throwing and catching lines to fasten the tug to barges and large ships in need of guidance. At times, she directs the captain when his vision is blocked, coordinating with him via a radio. Sometimes this means scrambling up a ladder onto a fuel barge being guided by the tug 'on the hip,' or from the side. ..."
NY Times
W - Tugboats in New York City
NY Times: Gentlemen, Start Your Tugboats
WNYC: The Tugboat, Workhorse of New York Harbor (Audio)
YouTube: New York on the Clock: Chris Baker, Tugboat Captain

Sound of Joy - Sun Ra and his Arkestra (1955)

Wikipedia - "Sound of Joy is an album by Sun Ra and his Arkestra. It features the Arkestral lineup during the last few months of 1956, after trombonist Julian Priester left to join Lionel Hampton, Charles Davis became a regular member of the band, and Victor Sproles took over on bass. It was intended as the follow-up to Jazz By Sun Ra but Transition Records ceased to operate before it could be released. Four of the tracks were included on Sun Ra and his Solar Arkestra Visits Planet Earth, released in 1966. The entire LP was eventually released in 1968 by Delmark Records, who also re-issued Jazz by Sun Ra. Two ballads, written by Sun Ra and sung by Clyde Williams, were left off the original album, however, because the president of Delmark Records, Bob Koester, 'felt they didn't fit with the other pieces on the session.' ..."
Wikipedia
Discogs
amazon
YouTube: Sound of Joy 47:41

Wild Dog - John Hoopes, Ed Dorn, Drew Wagnon, and others

Wild Dog, vol. 3, no. 21 (March 1, 1966).
"In many respects—name, form, and content—Wild Dog boldly embodies much of what we identify as the 'mimeo revolution.' Preceded in Pocatello by A Pamphlet, Wild Dog, which joined the mimeograph revolution in April 1963, was the brainchild of Edward Dorn, who was familiar with the emergence of divergent American writing through his association with Black Mountain College, where he had studied under Charles Olson and Robert Creeley. The literary direction that Dorn brought to Wild Dog encompassed writing from diverse sources including, but not limited to, writers associated with The Black Mountain Review, the San Francisco Renaissance, the Beat generation, the New York School, and certain 'hip' European and South American publications and poets. ..."
From a Secret Location
Verdant Press
Jacket2: Twelve letters from Kenneth Irby to Edward Dorn

Nine Albums to Get You Ready for Mardi Gras in New Orleans

Professor Longhair – New Orleans Piano Music
"Mardi Gras in New Orleans is pure indulgent sensory overload. Smells of boudin balls and gumbo waft in the wind, strings of beads fly through the air and plenty of booze-fueled dancing set the holiday apart from any other in the country. With the start of Carnival season comes fanciful parades, colorful king cakes, and pretty Big Chiefs strutting with their krewes. It’s no surprise that musicians in the birthplace of Jazz have paid tribute to their home city with iconic Mardi Gras music. Carnival season is best spent immersing yourself in the music of New Orleans. With its quick rhythm, swampy cadence and brassy melodies, the style perfectly encapsulates the feeling of Mardi Gras. Like those first warm breezes rolling in from the Gulf of Mexico, the warm sound of vinyl is the perfect fit for these classic New Orleans’ albums. Get your feet dancing and funk up your Fat Tuesday with these picks. ..."
Discogs
W - Mardi Gras in New Orleans
NY Times: Navigating Mardi Gras in New Orleans
YouTube: Celebrating Mardi Gras in New Orleans | National Geographic, THE HISTORY & TRADITIONS OF MARDI GRAS PROMO, Mardi Gras World, New Orleans, LA - Travel Thru History Show

A float in the Rex parade in New Orleans on Mardi Gras Day in 2013.

How Sexual Harassment Shapes Politics in Washington

"Eight Essays On Sexual Discrimination And Harassment In D.C., Across Politics, Policy, And The Media. February 8, 2018. Elizabeth Drew - Ana Marie Cox - Sarah Jones - Eve Fairbanks - Heather Boushey - Ai-jen Poo - Monica Potts - Jill Abramson. ... Domestic Workers, Too by Ai-jen Poo. Executive Director of the National Domestic Workers Alliance. As the United States faces up to the prevalence and impact of sexual misconduct in the workplace, the consistent story we have heard from survivors, time and again, is one of power imbalance. Actual or perceived, the distance between power held by men and by women in this country has directly resulted in cycles of harassment, misconduct, and abuse from which our society has looked away for decades. Imagine, then, the breeding ground for abuse created in the nation’s capital by some of the world’s most powerful men—and it is usually men—for the domestic workers laboring behind the closed doors of their Washington residences. ..."
New Republic

The History of 121 Chambers

No. 121 Chambers ran through the block to No. 103 Reade (left). The James Gilbert building, abutting, was designed to visually include No. 103, the center section being a near-match to the Chambers Street facade.
"... When Nicholas Gilbert purchased the property at No. 121 Chambers Street in 1835, the area was still a respectable, residential one. At the same time, he bought the three lots directly behind, at Nos. 103 through 107 Reade Street. Gilbert and his family moved into the Chambers Street house; but would not stay appreciably long. By Gilbert’s death in 1851 his former home was being run as a boarding house, and the three Reade Street houses were rented to blue collar workers and servants. By 1860 the area was seeing the rise of handsome commercial buildings and lofts. That year Gilbert’s two sons divided up the property and set about to replace the old houses with modern money-making business buildings. Frederick Gilbert, who was a ship chandler by trade, took the family home and the house directly behind it at No. 103 Reade. ..."
Tribeca Citizen
Landmarks Approves Expansion of 121 Chambers Street, TriBeCa

2017 July: Seeking New York: The Stories Behind the Historic Architecture of Manhattan, 2017 October: The History of 452 Greenwich Street

Bob Dylan World Tour 1966

Wikipedia - "The Bob Dylan World Tour 1966 was a concert tour undertaken by American musician Bob Dylan, from February to May 1966. Dylan's 1966 World Tour was notable as the first tour--actually a continuation of his late 1965 U.S. tour--where Dylan employed an electric band backing him, following his 'going electric' at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival. The musicians Dylan employed as his backing band were known as The Hawks; they subsequently became famous as The Band. The 1966 tour was filmed by director D. A. Pennebaker. Pennebaker's footage was edited by Dylan and Howard Alk to produce a little-seen film, Eat the Document, an anarchic account of the tour. ... There are also many unofficial bootleg recordings of the tour. Dylan's 1966 Tour ended with his motorcycle accident late on Friday afternoon, July 29, 1966. ..."
Wikipedia
World Tour 1966: The Home Movies Through the Camera of Bob Dylan's Drummer
Pitchfork
11 beautifully restored images of Bob Dylan's 1966 tour (Video)
“Bob Dylan: The 1966 Live Recordings” is Available Now!
Skeleton Keys - Bob Dylan 1966
amazon
NY Times: Bob Dylan On Tour in 1966 (Video)
YouTube: BD & The Band - Live 1966 Concert Film 32:49

Jean Dubuffet

Vicissitudes, 1977
Wikipedia - "Jean Philippe Arthur Dubuffet (31 July 1901 – 12 May 1985) was a French painter and sculptor. His idealistic approach to aesthetics embraced so called 'low art' and eschewed traditional standards of beauty in favor of what he believed to be a more authentic and humanistic approach to image-making. He is perhaps best known for founding the art movement Art Brut, and for the collection of works—Collection de l'art brut—that this movement spawned. Dubuffet enjoyed a prolific art career, both in France and in America, and was featured in many exhibitions throughout his lifetime. ...  Dubuffet achieved very rapid success in the American art market, largely due to his inclusion in the Pierre Matisse exhibition in 1946. His association with Matisse proved to be very beneficial. Matisse was a very influential dealer of contemporary European Art in America, and was known for strongly supporting the School of Paris artists. Dubuffet's work was placed among the likes of Picasso, Braque, and Rouault at the gallery exhibit, and he was only one of two young artists to be honored in this manner. A Newsweek article dubbed Dubuffet as the 'darling of Parisian avant-garde circles,' and Greenberg wrote positively about Dubuffet's three canvasses in a review of the exhibit. ..."
Wikipedia
MoMA, PACE
NYBooks: The Art of Instinct
Sotheby's: Jean Dubuffet – The Butterfly Man (Video)
YouTube: A Short History of Artist Jean Dubuffet, Jean Dubuffet The Asylum. Helly Nahmad London at Frieze Masters 2015, Jean Dubuffet - The Deep End, Jean Dubuffet at Sotheby's, NYC (Nov 2009)

Jean Dubuffet in his studio in Venice, France, 1959.

2013 March: Outsider Art

2018 Winter Olympics

Wikipedia - "The 2018 Winter Olympics, officially known as the XXIII Olympic Winter Games  and commonly known as PyeongChang 2018, is a major international multi-sport event scheduled to take place from 9 to 25 February 2018 in Pyeongchang County, South Korea. ... The torch relay started on 24 October 2017 in Greece and will end at the start of the Olympics on 9 February 2018. On 1 November 2017 the relay entered Korea. The relay will last 101 days. There will be 7,500 torch bearers to represent the 75 million population living in Korea. There will also be 2018 support runners. The support runners will guard the torch and be messengers. ... The 2018 Winter Olympics will feature 102 events in 15 sports, making it the first Winter Olympics to surpass 100 medal events. Four new disciplines in existing sports were introduced to the Winter Olympic programme in Pyeongchang, including big air snowboarding, mixed doubles curling, mass start speed skating, and mixed team alpine skiing. ,,,"
Wikipedia
NY Times
CBS
NBC
Competition Schedule

Arto Lindsay ... Simply Are

"Arto Lindsay (b. 1953) is an American guitarist and experimental composer based between Rio, Berlin and New York whose signature combination of velvet voice and noise guitar is an energetic hybrid of post punk, free jazz and Tropicalia styles. He has stood at the intersection of music and art for more than four decades. As a member of DNA, he contributed to the foundation of No Wave. As bandleader for the Ambitious Lovers he developed an intensely subversive pop music, a hybrid of American and Brazilian styles. He contributed to groups such as The Flying Lizards and the Golden Paliminoes and has collaborated with both visual and musical artists, including Vito Acconci, Laurie Anderson, John Zorn, Animal Collective, Matthew Barney, David Byrne, Caetano Veloso, Rirkrit Tiravanija and many others. ... Off The Page offers a unique opportunity to gain insight into Lindsay's extensive and diverse artistic career in an exclusive artist talk."
Off The Page - NY Musikk (Video)
Bandcamp (Audio)

2009 October: Arto Lindsay, 2012 July: Lounge Lizards, 2015 October: The Golden Palominos - The Golden Palominos (1983), 2015 November: Love Of Life Orchestra ‎– Extended Niceties EP (1980), 2017 October: The Lounge Lizards - Lounge Lizards (1981)

Counter Intelligence: Montréal

"There’s something to be said about a city that boasts two official languages. Known for its charming European flair, the creative weave of Montréal’s bilingual and multicultural fabric is a breeding ground for alternative culture. Combined with an affordable cost of living, the city is a hotbed of artists who sustain a strong DIY community and a healthy nightlife scene, so it only makes sense that Montréal record shops are thriving in parallel. Avid and casual collectors alike are privy to a solid network of new and used record stores scattered across the city, each offering a unique selection to a loyal following. In anticipation of the first ever Montréal edition of the Red Bull Music Academy Weekender this fall, we dug into the dust of the bins belonging to a handful of these shops. ..."
Red Bull Music Academy Daily

Anthology: You've Got to Have Freedom - Pharoah Sanders (2005)

"Anthology: You've Got to Have Freedom is exactly what it says but is also more. This two-disc set is culled from Pharoah Sanders' Impulse! catalog; it is these recordings that gave him his place in jazz history -- apart from the years he spent with John Coltrane. Sanders was unfairly pegged with carrying on the Coltrane legacy in free jazz; he was often called 'the new Coltrane.' This set confirms and underscores Sanders' reputation for being a truly restless and creative force in jazz. What makes this anthology so utterly special is that it is the first one of its kind to cross-license tracks from a number of labels. ... Given that listeners have no Pharoah Sanders box set -- and Impulse! should get it together and release one -- this collection is as good as it gets. Some will have trouble with the edits and that's to be expected; others would have chosen some different tracks and that is as well. But when all is said and done, this offers a multidimensional portrait of a musician who has never gotten his proper due. ..."
allmusic
Discogs
amazon
YouTube: You've got to have Freedom (Live)

2015 December: Maleem Mahmoud Ghania With Pharaoh Sanders - The Trance Of Seven Colors (1994), 2016 January: Ptah, The El Daoud - Alice Coltrane & Pharoah Sanders (1970), 2016 November: Tauhid (1967), 2017 May: The Pharoah Sanders Story: In the Beginning 1963-1964, 2017 November: Let Us Now Praise Pharoah Sanders, Master of Sax

The Long Brazilian Crisis

"Wednesday, January 24, 2018 might prove to be an infamous day in the history of Brazil. That day, a regional court of appeals in the southern city of Porto Alegre voted unanimously to uphold former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s corruption conviction, sentencing him to twelve years in prison. For many, Lula’s conviction marks a victory against the culture of elite impunity and criminality that scars Brazilian politics. For most of the Left, this judgment represents another nail in the coffin of Brazilian democracy, as a reactionary judiciary seeks to ban Brazil’s most popular politician from competing in the upcoming 2018 elections. ..."
Jacobin

What Trump’s Speech Says About His Mental Fitness

"As part of the discussion about Donald Trump's lack of fitness for the presidency, some have argued that his linguistic capacities have worsened, suggesting significant cognitive decline. In interviews in the 1980s and 1990s, Mr. Trump speaks in complete sentences, using mature vocabulary and expressions. There aren’t the endless digressions that make his current mode of expression a kind of vocal fantasia. America has certainly never experienced a commander in chief who expressed himself in this fashion. In public, at least. However, the distinction between public and private speech is key here, so I am unconvinced that his current speech patterns can be analyzed as evidence of dementia. Instead, they’re characteristics of casual speech as it has always existed. It is easy to forget how much casual speech in general differs from writing. We tend to imagine our speech is tidier than it often is. The complete sentences and logical throughlines of writing are a stylization of speech, rather than a mirror image. Take this famous Trump utterance from July 2016. ..."
NY Times (Video)
GQ: It’s Officially Fair to Question Donald Trump’s Mental Fitness - Jan. 8, 2018 (Video)

His Master's Voice - Stanisław Lem (1968)

Wikipedia - "His Master's Voice (original Polish title: Głos Pana) is a science fiction novel on the "message from space" theme written by Polish writer Stanisław Lem. It was first published in 1968 and translated into English by Michael Kandel in 1983. It is a densely philosophical first contact story about an effort by scientists to decode, translate and understand an extraterrestrial transmission. The novel critically approaches humanity's intelligence and intentions in deciphering and truly comprehending a message from outer space. ... Throughout the book Hogarth—or rather, Lem himself—exposes the reader to many debates merging cosmology and philosophy: from discussions of epistemology, systems theory, information theory and probability, through the idea of evolutionary biology and the possible form and motives of extraterrestrial intelligence, with digressions about ethics in military-sponsored research, to the limitations of human science constrained by the human nature subconsciously projecting itself into the analysis of any unknown subject. ..."
Wikipedia
conceptual fiction
amazon

2011 June: Stanisław Lem, 2017 March: Pilot Pirx (1979-1982), 2017 April: The Star Diaries (1971)

Augustus Pablo Presents Rockers International (2015)

"Originally issued as two separate album releases this 2CD remastered edition collects up 28 Augustus Pablo classic from the golden age of Rockers. Melodica masterpieces, deep dubs and classic vocal sides from the likes of Jacob Miller, Junior Delgado, Earl Sixteen etc. all built on Augustus Pablo signature rock solid drum and bass foundations. The sound is very good--clean, warm, organic, and fairly crisp. The 10 page booklet has an essay on Pablo and the music, plus a list of musicians, a few period photos, and a list of tunes on each original album. These are the original albums with no extra tracks added. But none are really needed--Pablo's production along with King Tubby's mixing efforts make these tracks some of Pablo's best work. There's a lot to like here utilizing Pablo's production skills, and mixing by Tubby, Prince Phillip Smart, Prince Jammy, and a couple of others. Mixing was done at King Tubby's, Channel One, and Harry J's studios. ..."
Holland Tunnel Dive
amazon
YouTube: Augustus Pablo Presents Rockers International - 28 videos

why tapes matter

"I’m pretty obsessed with contemporary cassette culture. Over the last few years, countless young and ambitious efforts have adopted the format – sculpting one of the most vibrant contexts of new music I’ve encountered, yet it seems – caught by the object itself (or simply not having a tape deck), people often miss what makes it so special. It feels reductive to mention the all mighty dollar – but it counts, and is generally downplayed in narrative of seminal music. Art is supposed to come first – and it does, but particularly for those of us who have shuffled through a frustrating flux in formats during the last three decades, it has played a significant role. Though everyone has their preferences and reasons, a largely unspoken factor which contributed to the vinyl revival we are currently witnessing, is that for many years (the 90’s and the first half of the 2000’s) LPs were the cheapest way to buy music. ..."
the hum

Death and Feminism in a Nutshell

"Homicide. Suicide by hanging. A great deal of drinking, mainly of whiskey, mainly by men. Blood pooled on the floor. Chairs overturned. Many weapons: guns and knives and ropes. Burned Cabin, where a burned skeleton is barely visible, Dark Bathroom, which contains a dead woman in a bathtub beside an empty liquor bottle, and Unpapered Bedroom, in a boarding house where an unknown woman has been found dead. In Frances Glessner Lee’s dioramas, the world is harsh and dark and dangerous to women. 'The Nutshell Series of Unexplained Death,' her series of nineteen models from the fifties, are all crime scenes. Glessner Lee built the dioramas, she said, 'to convict the guilty, clear the innocent, and find the truth in a nutshell.' ..."
The Paris Review
Murder Is Her Hobby: Frances Glessner Lee and The Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death (Video)
NY Times: Heiress Plotted 19 Grisly Crimes. Investigation Underway.
W - Frances Glessner Lee
NPR: The Tiny, Murderous World Of Frances Glessner Lee (Audio)

Red Winter - Anneli Furmark (2018)

"Timed perfectly to our snow day here in Montreal, Anneli Furmark's Red Winter hits stores today, and I can't think of a better book to curl up on the couch with. Set in northern Sweden in the late seventies, where the political climate is tense, and the harshness is exasperated by the relentless chill, Red Winter is a visual masterpiece, with a cold blue and orange watercolour palette that enhances Anneli's already incredibly expressive cartooning style. Though the story revolves around Siv, a married mother of three, and her young lover, Ulrik, a communist recently arrived from southern Sweden, with a mission to infiltrate the local steelworkers union, at its core, it's the story of a mother reclaiming her sense of self. ..."
Drawn and Quarterly
Anneli Furmark
amazon