Even if you are not a fan of country music, chances are you remember Deana Carter from when she took the music world by storm with her smash hit "Strawberry Wine" in 1996.
The last line of the first song on Bishop Allen's debut album is "my charm school made me ready for today." For the purposes of this article, "today" is last Friday, when the band played Tokyo Rose, and "Charm School" is in fact the title of their debut album.
It's true, her music has evolved, furthering itself, keeping its shape but shedding old skin, snake-like.
Stephen Malkmus is back. Not the straight-lined, pop-driven Stephen Malkmus from his self-titled debut, but the old Stephen Malkmus that we all know and love, Pavement incarnate. His eponymous debut appropriately ignored a billing for the rest of his band, the Jicks.
When a Special Forces assassin goes off the deep end (and we are talking all the way off), it's up to the guy who trained him to stop him ... or die trying. Aaron Hallam (Benicio Del Toro) is one of the best assassins the Special Forces has ever seen, but it seems "battle stress" has gotten the best of him -- or all of him, for that matter.
I went into "Willard" expecting a bite-sized, somewhat stale chunk of cheese. I am a card-carrying Crispin Glover fanatic and will sit through just about anything to savor one of his idiosyncratic performances, and I expected nothing more than some kooky Crispin action from this film.
"Agent Cody Banks" is fun. Granted, it's extremely predictable, seen-it-all-before fun, but fun nonetheless.
Hopefully by now everyone is painfully aware of the problems that plague 'Black Hollywood.' Denzel Washington and Halle Berry's historic night at the Oscars last year and their political speeches were enough to jolt anyone that was unmindful of the poor casting, lack of funding and stereotypical roles that minorities in Hollywood face.
Think of it this way: the 2003 NCAA men's basketball tournament started Tuesday, March 18th, and the 75th annual Academy Awards ceremony is this Sunday, March 23.
An experiment in entertainment, according to founding father Casey Spooner. An audiovisual extravaganza.
I knew what I was getting into when I decided to review "So Long, Astoria," but I couldn't turn away.
Ben Harper fans have desperately waited three years for the release of a new album. Well, the wait has paid off with "Diamonds on the Inside," an album that shows that Harper has not lost his touch. Ben Harper first broke onto the music scene in 1994 with the release of "Welcome to the Cruel World" -- a politically charged album that spoke of urban oppression.
How far will you go to promote a cause you believe in? What will you sacrifice --- your job, your friends, your family?When all is said and done, how far is too far? These are the questions raised in the recently released suspense film, "The Life of David Gale." The movie chronicles the story of David Gale (Kevin Spacey), a philosophy professor and anti-death penalty activist sitting on death row for the murder of a fellow activist.
I have seen "Old School," and it is us. From every fiber of its plot to every part of our collective Rugby Road-going soul, "Old School" calls out to us, drawing us in to its web of frat debauchery.
Sometimes the power is simply in the voice, in the way the vibrations of sound can coat words with a new authority, an indescribable presence.
"Bringing Down the House," a new comedy starring Steve Martin and Queen Latifah, finds its comic subject matter and then beats it to a pulp.
When given the assignment to review Fabolous' "Street Dreams," I was excited. Fabolous took the hip-hop world by storm last year with his mixtape assault and guest cameos where he made sure to spell his name out every time he opened his mouth.
"Don't trust anyone over thirty," the 1960s maxim goes, and hand in hand with the phrase is often "Don't listen to anything released after the rise of Disco." Well, score one for our generation, because the latest British export is sure to please quite a few classic rock purists.
Releasing a concept album is one thing, but including stage directions in the liner notes is where I draw the line. Much like the stage directions on "The Ugly Organ," Cursive manages to take an otherwise solid album to unnecessary extremes.
Country-fried southern rock has been making as much noise as Duane Allman's decrepit corpse as of late. Beachwood Sparks once offered the most unfeigned perpetuation of Gram Parson's vision had he survived Joshua Tree but increased the intensity of his morphine-fueled haze.Lately, tough, the band has forsaken any grit or edge their drugged-out minds could muster for a painfully-sensitive, sleepy monotony.
