One of the most intriguing and unexpected current-day musical phenomena is the popularity of tiki, or exotica, a style of music dating back to the mid-20th century. Exotica is quintessentially American — the perfect soundtrack for cocktail hour. In its original quirky run, exotica’s leading lights included Martin Denny, Arthur Lyman, and Juan García Esquivel. […]
Florence Shaw doesn’t tell jokes. As the singer-lyricist for the British post-punk band Dry Cleaning, she speaks in fragments and riddles, in social commentary and startling understatement, mixing serious notions with observations on the human comedy all around her. “We take humor pretty seriously,” says Shaw, whose exceedingly calm sung-spoken delivery is an essential character […]
“My hand broke, ‘coz I was trying to keep my head from hitting the metal,” says Amanda Shires, wildcat of alt-country-rock. She splays her claws and runs a finger up the damage zone. “Feel any different playing instruments after?” I ask. After all, she’s been a pro-fiddler since joining the Texas Playboys at 15. “Yeah, […]
A quarter century since the passing of his father — beloved Cockney poet, punk, and actor Ian Dury — there is much that unites the sound of vocalist-composer Baxter Dury to his dad. And more that does not. Especially now that Baxter’s dry, witty brand of sing-speak is married to the bubbling-over electronic music of […]
Epiphanies come, as epiphanies do, in unexpected and often far-flung settings. For trumpeter Amir ElSaffar, three such horizon-openers converge in his latest album, New Quartet Live at Pierre Boulez Saal. Recorded at the famed Frank Gehry-designed concert hall, it’s a scintillating performance in which he is joined by Ole Mathisen on saxophone, Tomas Fujiwara on […]
I remember the confusion and excitement I felt seeing “Captain” Lou Albano of the WWE (formerly called the WWF) appear in Cyndi Lauper’s “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” music video when it premiered in December 1983. Why was a wrestling star in a Cyndi Lauper video on MTV? It turns out that Albano and […]
Mark Feld was born in London in 1947, and adopted the stage name Marc Bolan as a teenager. Like many British rock stars of his generation, Bolan flirted with different sounds as he adapted to the rapidly changing times, starting a skiffle band as a child before becoming a mod and then a psychedelic folkie. […]
Richard Philip Henry John Benson was not a normal person. In the mid-90s, he was a hunk Italian prog guitarist in nuts-tight denim, bare-chested beneath a black silk blazer, famous across Rome for his fretboard stunt show VHS tapes. The guitar tricks on his mail-order “instructional” videos were nearly irreplicable — dizzying two-hand tap triplets […]
Name Crispian Mills of Kula Shaker Best known for Britpop on to Lord Krishna (people are still high from that mantra shizz). Current city London, rehearsing for a tour. Really want to be in Home in Penzance, Cornwall. If I was there I would be staring out of the window at the beautiful island of St Michael’s Mount, reminding myself that the […]
Horror Show is a new series uncovering the stories of artists’ experiences with the supernatural, paranormal, and unexplained—and how surviving it provided new appreciation for creating in the here and now. For many generations, the family of filmmakers Ximena and Eduardo García Lecuona has experienced a long-running phenomenon: When it’s your time to leave this […]