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Everyone’s Talking ’bout Fugazi: After you read Ryan Little‘s thinky Washington City Paper feature on the post-hardcore band’s new live archive, check out Marc Masters‘ for the Washington Post. Masters quotes critic John Gross saying, “At times they reminded me more of song-based jazz than rock…When they got a good head of steam going, you really thought, “Man, this is the best live rock band of their generation.'”
Everyone’s Talking ’bout Black Cat Bill: First, make sure you read Ryan Little’s WCP revelation that, contrary to some posts on local blogs last week, Black Cat Bill is indeed alive. Then check out the corrections and apologies it inspired. Then, check out the media criticism that followed. Then, bring William “Willy” Turner some tunes.
Everyone’s Still Talking ’bout Michael Kaiser: I can’t believe we’re still on this. In a Huffington Post column, contributor Rob Bettmann responds to the responses (including ours) to Kennedy Center president Michael Kaiser‘s recent ham-fisted HuffPo column about the withering state of arts criticism. What does Bettmann say? Essentially, he defends the gate-keeping, canon-defining role of critics, quotes a bunch of New York Times essays, fails to address any particular criticism of Michael Kaiser, confuses the editors of the New York Times‘ Book Review with its editorial board, attempts to invoke behavioral psychology, lambasts the Internet for being too big, and wraps up by plugging an initiative by the magazine he edits. To borrow some words from one of my favorite critics: “It stinks! It stinks! It stinks!”
Today on Arts Desk: More on Black Cat Bill. How D.C. fared in the Grammy nominations.