A Magazine of Popular (and Unpopular) Culture
Starting in 1958, the sound of American pop music became heavily influenced by the aesthetic sensibilities of a single neurotic teenage boy from New York City. Phil Spector’s “Wall of …
Steve Albini: The Anti-Spector
There is a meme going around social media these days, shared chiefly among late Boomers and Gen Xers, featuring the image above, and bearing the legend: DON’T TELL ME ABOUT …
From Spiked Beer to Champagne
Burt Freeman Bacharach, a towering figure of American song, has passed at the age of 94. What can be said of the man that hasn’t already been codified in legend …
Bacharach to Basics
Americans now in their 50s grew up in a time of radical innovation at the intersection of public education and mass media. In the late 1960s, citizen groups such as …
Knowledge is Power!
Well, another year is just about in the can, and as usual, there is a long list of talented folks who have left us over the past twelve months. For …
In Memoriam 2022
In modern-day America, the hallmarks of middle age include, among many other signifiers, opening your mailbox to find that first mailer from AARP, noticing antique tags on cars that were …
Museum Pieces
In 2003 I was hired as managing editor of a startup free weekly paper in Wichita. F5 Weekly (RIP) covered music, movies, art, politics, etc., and the whole of the …
Secret Meetings: An Alternative Playlist
Music heads everywhere were stunned and saddened this week to hear of the passing of industry icon Mo Ostin, a man who somehow became one of the most successful music …
Thirty Songs in Memory of Mo Ostin
I grew up in the ’70s on the Cherokee Strip, right on the Kansas side of the Oklahoma border, and our hometown had a pork processing plant that employed many …
The Ballad of C.W. McCall
Today is the first day of spring, and boy, is the Honk home office happy about it. In honor of the season of rebirth, renewal and fresh starts, here is …
Hooray for Flowers!