My experience with Lewis Black is primarily from his Back in Black segments on “The Daily Show” and a couple of his stand up albums. These performances are typified by yelling righteous indignation at the right and the hypocrisy of the system, and this (audio)book certainly featured some of that with the likes of Pat [...]
Posts under ‘Media’
The Yiddish Policemen’s Union (Michael Chabon)
I don’t know what it was about the AC Transit, but I loved reading on that bus. Twenty minutes, twice a day, it just worked. CTA should have been even better with the hour commute twice each day. Whether it was the excessive noise or the multiple transfers I could never regain that rhythm. Instead [...]
Taking down the JK Rowling empire
Warning possible spoilers ahead! Just so we’re on the same page, Voldemort is going around killing people and eventually tries to kill Harry Potter. He’s thwarted in this pursuit, because his mother gives her life to save him. So am I to believe that Harry is the first child that Voldemort tries to murder? Wouldn’t [...]
A Haiku Pondering the Modern Popularity of a Japanese Style of Poetry
Latest fad: haikus Why are they so popular? Look, it’s a haiku!
The Cuckoo’s Egg (Cliff Stoll)
It took about a hundred pages, but this turned into a pretty good book. That’s about when the action picked up, but also when I figured out that this was a true story. It’s quite strange to read a book from the mid-1980′s in the eWorld of 2007. The author spends a significant amount of [...]
The Wisdom of Crowds (James Surowiecki)
This is not an easy premise to buy into, judging by who the president is and what’s played on the radio. What it boils down to however is sample size. Even if it’s from the world’s leading expert, the judgment from a single person is at a disadvantage compared to the collected opinion of many. [...]
The Decemberists at the Riviera
A few thoughts in retrospect of the Decemberists show a couple weeks ago: By my count, they only played 13 songs, but since three of those were more than ten minutes each. I never thought I’d see a show which featured an accordion. And like it. Nor did I ever expect to see a large, [...]
Naked Pictures of Famous People (Jon Stewart)
Does anyone remember the pre-Daily Show Jon Stewart? I don’t remember much about him, except that MTv kept giving him shows. They weren’t funny. I didn’t think anything he said was funny. When Stewart replaced Craig Kilborn on The Daily Show, I actually thought it was a step down for Comedy Central (if that’s possible). [...]
The Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)
The Kite Runner is the five-tool player of books; it does a lot of things well. But, as with many five-tool players in baseball, it has no truly outstanding points. The plot is good, but a tad formulaic. The theme of redemption has been done better elsewhere. I hoped this would be sort of an [...]
The Tipping Point (Malcolm Gladwell)
The Tipping Point evolved from an explanation of word-of-mouth into a study on epidemic theory on social trends. Like Gladwell’s other book, Blink, the chapters are layed out as a series of personal anecdotes and sociological or psychological experiments which support the chapter’s hypothesis. Highlights include the fall and rise of Hush Puppies and the [...]
Camera Obscura – Let’s Get Out of This Country
I’m slightly scared of this album cover. But it got my attention, and after checking out their visit to Morning Becomes Eclectic, Camera Obscura [official site / allmusic entry] made it to the list. This is their third, and most polished, full length album. The tone is pretty mellow and upbeat highlighted by Tracyanne Campbell’s [...]
Flake Music – When You Land Here, It’s Time to Return
When I discovered the Shins, I completely devoured their two albums. I almost resorted to buying CD singles just to get a few more of their tracks. It wasn’t until listening to their show on Morning Becomes Eclectic that I learned about their predecessors, Flake Music. I’m not sure predecessors is the right word, since [...]