Reports are that the Justice Dept is "preparing" to sue Live Nation (ticketmaster) for antitrust violations, and the people are (or will be) happy! TM controls 70% of the initial sales of tickets at the country's largest venues and has exclusive contracts with many of them (per Andrew Ross Sorkin). ...

The WaPo reported today that "It’s budget week on Capitol Hill, with many cabinet officials and agency heads set to testify before the House and Senate appropriations committees about the fiscal year 2025 budget..." The article failed to mention that there is still no budget for 2024 which would see...

The pathetic human being known as JD Vance just wrote a (not surprisingly) pathetic defense of the no aid to Ukraine position in the Washington Post. Unfortunately the comments section was closed by the time I got around to it. It's not like I think that JD or even any of his staff will read or care...

I needs to know: WHAT. WILL. HAPPEN. TO. THE. CHILDREN???!!!

Devil in a Blue Dress, the movie version of Walter Mosely's classic detective story is pretty good. It has Denzel, so it's halfway home from the get go. It's hard to say what keeps the movie in the "good but not great" category, maybe the pacing? But it's a solid movie worth watching. As always dep...

I was not aware that there was a Lee Child/Reacher book that I hadn't read, so I reluctantly picked up The Secret which following recent custom is co-authored w/ Lee's brother Andrew. As expected it was nowhere near the quality of the early, solely written by Lee, novels. I suspect (but don't know) ...

The Dynasty has gotten a fair amount of negative response around here on the basis that it throws Belichick under the bus and distorts events to make the Krafts look good. I haven't watched [yet?] so can't make any substantive comment. We kind of tripped over Sugar not knowing anything about it but ...

With friends like this...

Trump on Speaker Mike Johnson:

"He’s doing about as good as you’re going to do."

In these times of the generally accepted reality that we as a society are unable to come to consensus agreement on just about anything, there was almost unanimous agreement back in 2022/23 that the Republican failure in the '22 elections was down primarily to abortion politics (i.e. the Dobbs decisi...

I do not understand this business of the bond Trump posted in the NY fraud case. According to reports and filings by the NY Attorney General, the bonding company is not licensed in NY, the bonding company does not meet the liquidity requirements to be a licensed bonding company in NY and the terms o...

Murder in the Family by Cara Hunter is a little bit different. The story is told completely in the form of transcripts of and news reports about a true crime tv series. I enjoyed it but I imagine the format is not for everyone. But it's a quick read so it's not a big investment of time if you want ...

Check this out bubba. Winslow has retired from writing novels & is battling the forces of evil: Yeah, I knew he was retiring (or at least saying so) and I've seen some of his political posts/writings but I didn't realize that he is formally and directly engaged in the political stuff. Needless to s...

Angelique KIdjo last nite at the Somerville Theater. Fantastic performer, great band.

cortez the killer wrote: ↑

Sun Apr 07, 2024 1:14 pm

Certainly more enjoyable than Cowboy Carter.

As they say in France chaque un a son goute.

cortez the killer wrote: ↑

Sat Apr 06, 2024 6:21 pm

Work in progress....

But why?

Agree or disagree with the rankings and/or the commentary, this is still an absolutely jaw dropping tour de force.

https://uproxx.com/indie/neil-young-best-songs-ranked/

brettac1 wrote: ↑

Fri Apr 05, 2024 11:39 am

The weirdness has already crossed my mind for the Milwaukee/Madison shows in late October. This is gonna be a weird ~7 months, even weirder than normal.

This (substituting other cities if we're being literal).

FWIW, livenation is pimping VIP tix for Chicago pretty hard.

Jack Flash wrote: ↑

Thu Apr 04, 2024 2:15 pm

Detroit on election night will sure beat watching CNN

No doubt it'll be a gas, gas, gas.*

*I'm giving myself permission for this one because i don't believe i've ever used it before over all the years.

How are ya? How's Emily? The kid?

When I saw Deadly Game by Michael Caine on the library shelf I asked myself is that the Michael Caine? The answer was yes, so curiosity piqued, I grabbed it. Kudos to him for branching out and for apparently writing the book on his own. As for the result, meh. I liked the main characters. The plot ...

Beyonce' - Cowboy Carter I suppose calling a Beyonce' album overhyped is kind of redundant, but that doesn't make it untrue. It's good but it's not that good. And it's a little bit country but it sure isn't a "country album." That's neither diss nor praise, just fact. I'd say that if there's a them...

When I saw Deadly Game by Michael Caine on the library shelf I asked myself is that the Michael Caine? The answer was yes, so curiosity piqued, I grabbed it. Kudos to him for branching out and for apparently writing the book on his own. As for the result, meh. I liked the main characters. The plot w...

As for Blackbird, it's a pretty basic tune and song. If you stay faithful to the original, which Bey does, I think it's kinda hard to screw it up To be clear, I don't think she screwed it up at all. I was just hoping she would do more of a personal interpretation along the lines of any great cover ...

I disclaim any implication of wisdom and I don't know anything about this festival in particular, but in general DBT festival sets are shorter than typical rock shows. If they're not headlining and in the middle of the bill you'll probably get about an hour and if they're closer to the top of the bi...

After seeing the band on Thursday and Sunday, I'd say if you have an opportunity to catch one of these shows to do it. Both nights were great and the sets had some good variation to them. Bruce sounds really good so far on this run. Yeah, the last couple of days I've been really wondering whether I...

Jonathan V. Last has an interesting column in today's Bulwark. He asks whether Trump is, in quantum physics terms, a particle or a wave, i.e. a symptom or a cause of the threats to the Republic associated with him, and concludes that he's both, which is imho the easy and correct answer. In the cours...

Trump's public social media company started trading yesterday. It closed its first day of trading selling at about two thousand times projected annual revenues. Plus it's losing millions of dollars. It's not a question of if, only when this thing crashes and when it does I don't want to hear any wh...

Beyonce' - Cowboy Carter I suppose calling a Beyonce' album overhyped is kind of redundant, but that doesn't make it untrue. It's good but it's not that good. And it's a little bit country but it sure isn't a "country album." That's neither diss nor praise, just fact. I'd say that if there's a theme...

Elvis Costello - King of America

Big Star - Radio City

Miles Davis - Bitches Brew

phungi wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 28, 2024 2:41 pm

You miss a day, you miss a lot!

Right? I keep saying