Posts by Alby

Add Paul Simon to the long list of musicians whose opening farewell did not mean goodbye. Now 83, Simon is on a 20-city tour of small venues performing two-set concerts,…

You know who doesn't love a parade? Donald Trump. After going to all the trouble and expense of making it the centerpiece of a big, beautiful birthday celebration, he sulked…

Political assassination has a long history in human affairs. Bernie Taupin wrote the lyric in 1969, the year after the MLK and RFK murders (John always wrote to Taupin's lyrics,…

Brian Wilson's musical genius was not matched by a way with words – he almost always co-wrote with a lyricist. For "Pet Sounds" he wanted to move beyond the teen-oriented…

I won't rhapsodize about Brian Wilson's talent – he always maintained it wasn't genius, it was hard work – because the entire music world has already done that. Even his…

Sly Stone, who died Monday at 82, didn't invent funk music – that honor goes to James Brown – but he's the first one who took it beyond the dance…

Of course Donald Trump sent the marines to Los Angeles. What's left of his mind was formed by the same John Wayne films Tom Lehrer cited when he wrote this…

Thanks to the Trump administration's desire to declare marshal martial law and its constant need to change the subject from its latest fuck-up, the excitable homunculi in charge are treating…

The media is intent on milking this Trump-Musk feud for all it's worth – schadenfreude might bring in as many clicks as rage does, or at least they hope so.…

I'm not convinced it's permanent, but the Trump-Musk breakup looks real – it's apparently costing both of them money, and I can't imagine they'd take kayfabe that far. I can…

Lots of rock musicians have careers that read like soap operas, but few bands have had more bad luck than Heart. Ann and Nancy Wilson had to overcome industry misogyny,…

Among the credits I left out of Rick Derringer's CV the other day was his production of this 1973 No. 1 hit for the Edgar Winter Group, one of the…

I notice that when politicians and pundits talk about immigration, it's usually as an abstract concept – immigration, as opposed to immigrants. That makes it much easier to ignore the…