Saturday’s specials:
I’m hoping Pride and Prejudice is the beginning of a turnaround for this movie year. In the next several days, I’ll be seeing Woody Allen’s Match Point, Andrew Adamson’s The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Peter Jackson’s King Kong, Michael Haneke’s Cache (Hidden), and more. I have high hopes for all of them, but the way this year has been going, it wouldn’t be a big surprise if each one of them disappointed.
“YOU WILL NOT LIKE ME.”
In the meantime, here’s The New York Times persuading me to wait until the DVD for Johnny Depp, Samantha Morton, and John Malkovich in The Libertine.
HOW CAN I GET YOU STALLONE?
And, in the name of hope and good moviegoing, here’s a script review of Rocky 6.
SINGLE PARENTS IN BRITAIN GET EARLY CHRISTMAS GIFTS
The Christian-outreach promotion of Narnia continues in Britain.
THERE ARE A MILLIONS REASONS TO SEE THIS MOVIE
In case you didn’t notice yet… it’s here, for rental and purchase. Merry Christmas.
A FEAST FOR MARTIN FANS
Thanksgiving came late for my wife Anne, who has been waiting for this book for a long, long time, and now she’s wrapped in blankets on the couch with her nose in its pages, and I doubt I’ll hear from her again for a long, long time…
I’ve never read Martin’s Work, any recomendations?
I’ve never read Martin, but Anne is a voracious reader of fantasy literature, and Martin is one of her favorites. She would heartily recommend starting with “A Game of Thrones.” (“A Feast of Crows” is the fourth book in that series.)
Once you start Martins you have a very hard time putting it down.
I would give it a mature rating and wouldn’t recommend it to youngsters, but very well written.
Adam Hildebrandt
any recomendations?
Secure copies of all four books before you start, as you really won’t want any downtime between them. Set aside a week or so, depending on how fast you read, because you’ve got 3000 odd pages to read, and no time for distractions like food or sleep.
Although all of these artists aren’t represented here, Chicago’s own local WXRT is a great source for ecclectic and quality music, recent and classic. And I have heard most of those artists at one time or another on it.
I believe it is wxrt.com, although I could be wrong.
89.3 The Current from Minnesota Public Radio is pretty good. While they don’t seem to play Over the Rhine, they do play most of the people you mentioned, plus a whole lot more.
Here’s a link:
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/radio/services/the_current/
After years of lamenting about how I couldn’t hear Philadelphia’s WXPN in the Washington, D.C., area, it occurred to me (about two weeks ago) that I could bookmark the site and stream the station.
Heard something of Sufjan Stevens’ “Michigan” within the first couple of hours. Today I heard John Mellencamp’s “Rain on the Scarecrow,” which just goes to show that XPN isn’t afraid to play decent mainstream rock at times.
You might also want to do a search on http://www.live365.com to see who’s playing artists you enjoy.
Jeffrey, throw in my buddy Richard Buckner & you’ve got youself a winning station!
And right now I can’t go anywhere without the latest by Nickel Creek, Idlewild, Aimee Mann & Josh Rouse on my person at all times.
And I’ve never heard Sufjan Stevens. Gotta do some research!
The only radio station I’ve ever heard that comes close to your dream playlist is KOTR in San Luis Obispo. The times I’ve been up there and had a chance to listen, they played just about everyone on your list that was around at the time (about 10 years ago). Sadly, they don’t seem to have a web presence…
The WNYC show “Spinning on Air” is a wonderful show on sunday nights. In its two hours the Host David Garland intreview very sweet musicians, or has themes and features multiple sweet musician.
He has had Sufjan Steven’s on twice, and played most of his Christmas stuff in a special December show. He has had the Books, Mum, Colleen, Devrenda Banhart, Danielson, Joanna Newsom, Jose Gonzalez, Vhasti Bunyan etc.
They have a downloadable archive, which is my favourite aspect of it.
through the advent of podcasting, I’ve discovered a few great stations. I echo the above post for WXPN, and if you can find a station that plays the syndicated show “World Cafe” (it’s on Friday nights here in SC, following “This American Life”), they tend to have a great variety of classics paired with modern counterparts. KUT out of Austin is another one that I’ve enjoyed from time to time, along with Radio Paradise and KFOG (out of San Fran).
Of course, Paste magazine has an online radio station as well: Paste Radio Listening Post
I don’t have time to do an exhaustive check but I believe Radio Paradise (www.radioparadise.com)plays most if not all of those you listed.
You might try Goshen College’s station the Globe
KCRW (Los Angeles). KCRW.com’s capabilities are getting better, too. KEXP is great – somehow the stream is patchy, at least for me.
There are other good directories of stations in the US and aboard – try http://www.vtuner.com, for example. (For radio, not for their software, that is.)
MIT used to maintain an excellent internet radio directory, though I’m not sure if that’s still the case.
Jeffrey, have you ever tried Pandora? It’s a site that creates stations for you. You just tell it the name of a favorite artist or song, and it starts by playing a song by that artist. Then it moves on to other groups that you might be interested in and creates a customized station. Very, very cool.
http://www.pandora.com/
I really like Pandora.com, also http://lastfm.com. Lastfm has a much larger library than Pandora, and also allows you to tag things. (You have to download their player, but it’s a tiny app with no spyware.) I’ve been listening to many artists via Lastfm over the past month or so, and have found a number of albums that are now on my “to buy” list.