Alright, let me try this as a Daniel Stern voiceover: “It was the fall of 2011. I was a fresh-faced college graduate living in my parents’ basement. My girlfriend had moved back to college, and I was stuck listening to Adele and Katy Perry fifty times a day on the radio like every other kid…
Back in 2015, I wrote a retrospective on the first 24 episodes of Count Gauntly’s Horrors from the Public Domain, the public access television series I produce and host in Fairfax, Virginia. At the time, I selected ten episodes I thought represented our best work to date. Now, more than three years later, we’ve produced sixty-four episodes…
Small Screen 66 – #48: American Pickers (History, 2010-Present) Last time, we looked at a show that inspired my first job. Now we turn to a show about the job I think I’d be best at. American Pickers follows the backwoods adventures of Mike Wolf and Frank Fritz. The two work as “pickers,” a manlier…
Brian mostly writes about movies and TV, but he’s contributed some music commentary over the years. This week, I’m revisiting seven some of his song reviews and recommendations. “We Are Number One” — From a Facebook message on 10/23/16 at 10:36 pm thought this might be up your alley [link to hour-long loop of “We are Number One”]…
Brian mostly writes about movies and TV, but he’s contributed some music commentary over the years. This week, I’m revisiting seven of his song reviews and recommendations. “Nasty Dan” by Johnny Cash – From “10 Things Brian Likes – Honorable Mentions (2 of 2)” (2014) This one qualifies as probably the most egregious omission in the entire…
Brian mostly writes about movies and TV, but he’s contributed some music commentary over the years. This week, I’m revisiting seven of his song reviews and recommendations. “Oscar Mayer Wiener Song” – #6 from “The Top 15 Advertising Jingles” (2015) Oscar Mayer bears the rare distinction of having not one, but two awesome jingles. The company’s ode…
Novelty, parody, and sketch songs have never been a major interest of mine. And most of my reviews would sound the same. So this week, instead of writing about the song, I’m going to pick one of its intriguing quirks or a related topic to spotlight. Spotlight: Chris Farley When I was in elementary school, my friend Andy introduced me to Chris…
This week, I’m going to share some cover songs that I like. My wife and I often talk about cultural institutions from our childhood and how they define our generation. The obvious one is Harry Potter, but it’s far from the only one. Disney‘s Renaissance; news coverage of 9/11; Max Martin‘s Britney/Backstreet Boys breakthrough. While not at…
This week, I’m going to share some cover songs that I like. Game of Thrones has become such a massive sensation that you can name-drop “Daenerys” or “Tyrion” or “Jon Snow” in casual conversation and assume people will know what you’re talking about. It’s one of this generation’s great zeitgeists. The show’s fantastic theme song…
Who is Adam Schlesinger? Find out this week, as I explore some of my favorite tracks by the power pop savant. As if running two successful bands, and now a third, plus ghostwriting for plenty of pop stars and other musical projects, wasn’t enough, Adam Schlesinger is also part of one of the most ambitious…