(There was actually one more ad in that last commercial break, a promo spot for MTV, featuring a guy tied up on the floor of an elevator, being forced to listen to the elevator operator sing along to a swelling orchestral melody.) “Five of the top 100 videos of 1988 are Michael Jackson videos,” Kevin […]
posted 12 June 2008 in 1988. 2 comments
I’ve interviewed Mark Wahlberg three times over the past two decades, during which time he turned into an movie star and improbably complex screen presence. (He’s playing the lead in this week’s new M. Night Shyamalan joint, The Happening.) The first interview was back in 1991, when he was still the frequently-shirtless rapper known as […]
posted 11 June 2008 in Archives, Articles. no comments yet
MTV plays a promo for a Michael Jackson video debuting on New Year’s Day at 5 pm, 8pm, 9pm, and 10pm: “Leave Me Alone.” In the clips we see, Jackson rides a toy airplane and dances with the Elephant Man’s bones. A stack of newspapers has fake tabloid headlines (“Michael Weds Alien”). I believe in […]
posted 10 June 2008 in 1988. 2 comments
Marv Albert’s my favorite sportcaster of all time. I’ve spent more hours than I can calculate listening to him. I’ve kept watching bad basketball games just because he was the guy calling them. The best description of his style: “Albert broadcasts like a man who has bet every penny he has on the game, and […]
posted 9 June 2008 in Archives, Articles. no comments yet
I’m delighted to say that after a hiatus of several years, I’ve returned to my flipwalks. If you’re not familiar with my flipwalk project, you can click here for the whole “48 Hours From Ground Zero” gallery. The short version is that while living in New York City, I would leave my house and determine […]
posted 6 June 2008 in Photos, Self-reflexive. 2 comments
Kevin Seal explains that the top-100 countdown will, in fact, have more than 100 songs in it. He doesn’t actually say they’re including the videos so they can pad out the countdown’s running time, but that’s the gist of it: “There are quite a few top-notch videos that you won’t see on this little countdown […]
posted 5 June 2008 in 1988. 4 comments
I almost wrote a college recommendation for Rivers Cuomo. Between Weezer and Pinkerton, he had decided to go back to college, and so he left me a voicemail asking if I would write him a recommendation for his Harvard application. We weren’t able to connect on the phone for a few hours, and by the […]
posted 4 June 2008 in Archives, Articles, Links. no comments yet
Another interview clip: all four Bangles sitting on a couch, not looking especially happy. “The idea you have in your head,” says guitarist Vicki Peterson, pointing to her head in case we’re not familiar with that part of her body, “is not going to get directly translated onto film. It just isn’t. There’s so many […]
posted 3 June 2008 in 1988. 3 comments
Two short items by me went up in recent days on the Rolling Stone website: a review of R.E.M.’s show last week at the Hollywood Bowl and an item on Joe Perry writing the music for “Walk This Way” (part of the “100 Greatest Guitar Songs of All Time” package). I am pleased to report […]
posted 2 June 2008 in Articles, Outside, Reviews. no comments yet
Over Memorial Day weekend, we went out to the Palm Springs area. We visited the nearby Joshua Tree park, and I learned that it is almost impossible to take either a good picture or a bad picture of the park–the subject just overwhelms whatever photographic point of view you might bring to it. (Or whatever […]
posted 30 May 2008 in Photos. no comments yet
