Reviews
Deftones Bring on the Blood Moon with Rooftop Performance in NYC: Recap, Photos + Video
Setting the Stage: After twice postponing their highly anticipated tour due to the pandemic, Deftones have finally hit the road again. Most of the fans in attendance at the Rooftop at Pier 17 in New York City had been holding onto their tickets for two years, and they were rewarded with a beautiful night of perfect weather on Sunday (May 15th). Not to mention, a full moon hung over the evening’s festivities, with a sensational real-life backdrop that included the Empire State Building to the left and the Brooklyn Bridge to the right. In fact, later on that night, a “blood moon” would be visible due to a total lunar eclipse. If that weren’t enough, French metal masters Gojira were providing direct support, with Australian electronic duo VOWWS opening the evening. Taking the Stage: With...
Sunflower Bean Give New York a Headful of Sugar at Webster Hall: Photos + Setlist
On the eve of the release of their new album, Headful of Sugar — and drummer Olive Faber’s birthday, no less — Sunflower Bean finally got to headline one of their hometown’s biggest venues: Webster Hall. (Get tickets for the rest of their upcoming headlining dates here.) The setlist featured almost every song from the trio’s latest LP (except highlight “Stand by Me,” which admittedly was a strange omission), but there were plenty of fan favorites and deep cuts in there too. “Twentytwo” — a track Julia Cumming revealed to us is her favorite song to play live — mad an appearance early on, while the encore closed with “Somebody Call a Doctor” off their very first EP, 2015’s Show Me Your Seven Secrets. While the concert was clearly a showcase for Headful of Sugar, it was also a fasci...
With Mr. Morale & the Big Steppers, Kendrick Lamar Chooses Himself and Makes a Masterpiece
“I choose me, I’m sorry.” The last five words on Kendrick Lamar‘s Mr. Morale & the Big Steppers hit the hardest for anyone who “did the work,” as trained and untrained therapists like to say. Kendrick’s fifth album, out today (May 13th), is a lot of things: part political analysis, part social critique, with a dash of familial observations. But from start to finish, it’s all therapy. Kendrick’s latest effort is the Compton emcee putting himself on the couch and asking, “Why?” Why is he addicted to women and cheating? Why is he overwrought with guilt when he can’t help old friends? Why does he bathe in toxic relationships? Or even why he’s so damn competitive when it comes to rap? Advertisement Kendrick created a double LP sure to inspire tons of ink spillage from the pop culture indust...
Firestarter Review: Zac Efron Stars In a Stephen King Remake That Quickly Flames Out
The Pitch: Stephen King adaptations have been a fixture of the big and small screens for decades, but there’s been a particular surge in recent years, following the blockbuster success of It. So it’s only natural that studios might circle back and revisit some of the adaptations that weren’t especially beloved in their day. Firestarter seems like a good candidate; the 1984 film version is more notable for its eclectic cast (including George C. Scott, Louise Fletcher, and a young Drew Barrymore!) than its meandering story (albeit one that’s largely faithful to the events of King’s book). The new Firestarter still follows Charlie (Ryan Kiera Armstrong), the pyrokinetic daughter of two telepathic parents, who goes on the run with her dad Andy (Zac Efron), pursued by the shadowy government for...
The Smile Builds an Alternate Universe Radiohead on A Light for Attracting Attention
Fifty-nine seconds into “The Same,” the first track from The Smile’s debut release A Light for Attracting Attention, the unmistakable voice of Thom Yorke begins singing about how “we are all the same” atop a sci-fi pulse of piano, acoustic guitar, and analog synthesizers. There’s no easy release from the tension of the song’s slowly creeping dread, and it soon begs an important question: how is an album with Radiohead’s singer, lead guitarist, and producer actually not, well, a Radiohead album? The answer lies somewhere in between Jonny Greenwood’s simple desire to work on something — anything — with Yorke during the lockdown era of the COVID-19 pandemic and a larger philosophical debate about the evolution of Radiohead’s music in the past 15 years. Both are reflected throughout the superl...
Apple TV+’s The Essex Serpent Is Sumptuous, Supernatural Gothic Romance: Review
The Pitch: 1890s England: a time where the rapid rise of scientific knowledge — medicine, technology, archaeology — clashed with Christian superstitions and fairy tales. In the middle is Cora Seaborne (Claire Danes), a woman recently widowed from a wealthy, abusive spouse, who sees the opportunity to find out who she is and what she really wants out of life. A fortuitous report out of Essex gives her the chance: A winged, fanged “serpent” is reportedly snatching people up outside the sleepy port town of Aldwinter. Armed with her wits, her interest in “naturalism,” her curious son Francis, and adventurous maid/companion Martha (Hayley Squires), Cora leaves her comfortable London life to solve the mystery once and for all. But she quickly finds herself at odds with the paranoid, God-fea...
Top Gun: Maverick Review: Tom Cruise Goes Full Throttle In a Sequel That Does the Original Justice
The Pitch: It may have taken 36 years, but even pandemic delays couldn’t keep Tom Cruise away from the danger zone. When viewers are reunited with Captain Pete Mitchell in Top Gun: Maverick, one of the military’s best-ever fighter pilots is still a Navy man, working on experimental aircraft after decades of avoiding promotions that would pull him out of the cockpit. But the brass, personified here by a very cranky Jon Hamm, has a new assignment for the ace: Train up a team of hotshot youths for an incredibly difficult (dare we say… impossible) mission into enemy territory. While a dozen officers are selected as candidates for the task, the most prominent are a very Maverick-esque pilot known as Hangman (Glen Powell) and Rooster (Miles Teller), the grown-up son of Maverick’s tragically dece...
Conversations with Friends Review: Hulu’s New Sally Rooney Romance Gets Intimate and Messy
The Pitch: In 2020, a Hulu adaptation of Sally Rooney’s sophomore novel took the spring by storm. Beloved by critics and audiences alike, Normal People launched Paul Mescal and Daisy Edgar-Jones into immediate stardom territory, and with good reason — the limited series was both tender and excruciatingly heavy; romantic and frustrating; hard to watch and impossible to turn off. It only makes sense that Hulu would want to give it all another go with Rooney’s debut novel, Conversations with Friends. This story follows introverted poet Frances (Alison Oliver) and her ex-girlfriend, best friend, and muse all at once, Bobbi (a luminous Sasha Lane). The two become involved with an older married couple, Melissa (Jemima Kirke) and Nick (Joe Alwyn), and the messy threads that tie them all...
Spoon Make Up for Postponement with Flawless Set in New York City: Photos + Setlist
No matter how careful or vaccinated we are, touring during the pandemic still isn’t easy. Spoon were recently forced to postpone a trio of shows after members of their party tested positive (and their current opener, Margaret Glaspy, had to pull out of a number of other shows for the same reason). When they finally did get back on track, Britt Daniel’s voice started to give out, causing yet more delays. It’s just not easy out there for touring bands right now — which makes shows like Spoon and Glaspy’s Friday, May 6th gig at New York’s Hammerstein Ballroom all the more special. The show was one of those three aforementioned postponements, rescheduled under the mini-tour title “Let’s Try This Again…” Spoon made up for the delay by delivering a ferocious set full of hits and surprises. They ...
Bad Bunny’s Un Verano Sin Ti Is Summer’s Swaggering, Flavorful Soundtrack: Review
After making history with his last album, Bad Bunny is taking a lawn chair to the beach and basking in his success with his new LP, Un Verano Sin Ti (“A Summer Without You”). Across a whopping 23 tracks, the Puerto Rican superstar celebrates the music of the Caribbean with his signature emo flow. In addition to the usual suspects of reggaeton and Latin trap, he explores influences that include merengue, bomba, and dembow music. He continues to push reggaeton forward with alternative acts like The Marías and Bomba Estéreo, adding touches of Afrobeat and house music in mix. With his most fun and colorful album yet, Bad Bunny is ready for the summer season. The rapper released a trio of albums in 2020, culminating in El Último Tour Del Mundo making history as the first all-Spanish language al...
On WE, Arcade Fire Raise the Stakes Higher Than Ever, But to Mixed Results: Review
“It’s an age of doubt/ and I doubt we’ll figure it out,” sings Win Butler on the first line of “Age of Anxiety I,” the opening track of Arcade Fire’s sixth studio album, WE (out Friday, May 6th). From the very start, things are bleak and contradictory; the song essentially describes a full-on panic attack, even though the music beneath it is synth-covered, electrifying dance-rock, and as the track comes to a close, Butler trades repetitions of the phrases “It’s all about you” and “It’s not about you.” The latter contradiction is a crucial one in the context of WE: There is a deep consideration from the band about the all-or-nothing cultural mentality that we find ourselves in in 2022, and the separation of “I” and “We” is what makes up the core of the album. The first half o...
Pusha T’s Patience Pays Off on It’s Almost Dry
A little over two decades into his career and approaching his 45th birthday, Pusha T is a veteran working in an industry constantly searching for new talent, and a genre redefining itself as quickly as it grows in popularity. Despite that, Pusha’s success comes from a discography decidedly contained by the single subgenre of “coke rap,” and featuring a small, consistent set of collaborators. On It’s Almost Dry, his fourth studio album, the Virginia rapper preaches the values, triumphs and losses of patiently walking this narrow path that has made his name synonymous with sinister raps about selling cocaine, and listed it among some of the most iconic artists of the past 10 years. For the first decade of his career, Pusha was half of hip-hop duo Clipse, alongside his brother Malice. The two...
