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"title": "Louis C.K. on his 'Louie' Hiatus: 'I Wanted the Show to Feel New Again'",
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"content": "\u003cp>Louis C.K. is now commonly acknowledged as one of the greatest comics of his generation. His celebrated FX series, \u003cem>Louie,\u003c/em> started its fourth season a couple weeks ago, after a 19-month hiatus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Louis C.K. created, writes, directs and stars in the series as a standup comic named Louie, who, like Louis C.K., is the divorced father of two young girls and shares custody with their mother. Last year, Louis C.K. also had prominent roles in two films: Woody Allen’s \u003cem>Blue Jasmine\u003c/em> and David O. Russell’s \u003cem>American Hustle\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Louis C.K. joins \u003cem>Fresh Air\u003c/em>‘s Terry Gross to discuss raising his daughters as a divorced dad and facing tough audiences.\u003c/p>\n\u003chr>\n\u003ch3>\u003cstrong>Interview Highlights\u003c/strong>\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>On the indefinite hiatus he took between Seasons 3 and 4 of \u003cem>Louie\u003c/em>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I wanted the show to feel new again. I felt like I did three seasons that were all one spurt, and that felt good and I wanted to forget the show, so I took time to forget about it. I aggressively forgot the show existed for a few months. I went on tour and did standup and did other work. I acted in some movies. … Then after about only really a month off, like vacation, I started to think about the show again and think about the first episode being like a pilot again. That’s the way I approached this season: do a show that’s brand new, even though I’m bringing back characters. I tried to start from scratch. I spent way more time writing the show than I ever have before, thinking of the stories and plotting them out. I spent a year doing the season; instead, usually I spend about six months or less from the beginning of the writing to the end of the writing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>On the troubled women that his character dates in the show\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It sort of became a trend after a couple of seasons. What’s fun to do with this guy on the show is just put stuff in front of him that he can’t resist: Here’s a beautiful woman and she doesn’t seem like a good choice for you, but there you go. I think I’m trying to beat something into his head. …\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I like showing a guy deal with bad choices. To me the show wouldn’t be very interesting if I was confronted with all very well balanced women, and then we go and have coffee and everything works out well and maybe we kiss and that’s the end of the episode. That’s not that funny to me. I’ve been playing that game over and over again for a while because it’s still fun for me; that’s why I’m still telling that story of the messed-up woman. It certainly doesn’t represent to me that that’s what women are like. To me it’s funny when people want a show to be an ideal of this-is-what-we-all-feel-is-the-best-version-of-a-woman and –a-man. I’m looking for weaknesses on both sides — it’s fun. But this season, I sort of try to fall in love for real and have a more real relationship.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>On the uncomfortable topics of his standup routine \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The areas I’m going into are touchy. Maybe there’s a God; maybe there isn’t. Is God divorced? Did God kill his wife? You feel a little sweat on the back of your neck when you get there, but if you stay there for a second, you can find something joyful and funny in it. And it’s such a great thing to go to a scary place and laugh. I mean, what’s better than that? …\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I just couldn’t help straying into these areas. It’s a little [mischievous]. I just want to go over there and see if there’s anything there. That’s just always been my nature. … I’m also not afraid of it. I’m not afraid if I go somewhere and I upset everybody. I’ve been there. I guess I was in trouble a lot when I was a kid, so I got used to it. When you’re never in trouble, you can never go to places like that. … I know I can survive everybody being pissed off at me. So when I started going onstage, I realized if I talk about this stuff I might upset people in the room, but it’s worth it because maybe there’s something there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>On building his onstage confidence\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There really isn’t a situation onstage that I feel like I won’t know how to handle. There’s some that I know that I can’t overcome. There are things where I’m like, “This crowd is just not gonna like me,” but I also have a plan for that. You have to stay cool. You can’t let them change your plan. … I have that confidence onstage. I know even if I don’t open well, it’ll be OK; even if I lose them, I’ll get them back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When I was first starting in New York, they had prom shows where they’d fill the audience with kids that were just at their prom and they’re all drunk on limousine booze and as soon as you get onstage, they start yelling at you, before they decide if they like you or not. They boo you when you hit the stage. I used to eat prom shows for dinner. I used to book as many prom shows as I could. First of all, they paid twice as much money — it’s the only time comedy clubs are compassionate to comedians. … But I’ve been onstage with people yelling and booing and throwing stuff at me and I’ve hung in there. I know how to handle that, so nothing scares me now onstage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>On being divorced with two children\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There is a version of divorced life where you’re partners and you’re both taking care of the kids, the kids are spending equal time with each parent, and there’s balance and there’s harmony between the parents because they’re not married in a bad marriage anymore. If you do it right, it’s a much better life for the kids. I was determined to make sure that my kids still felt me in their lives after divorce. And then I was astonished to find out that they wanted to be with me all the time, that this was positive for them. … And also that motivated me to make a good life for myself so that the kids would have a good home when they came to my place. And their mom is a good co-parent; we’re good partners together, we’re friends and we’ve both I think done a pretty good job of letting the kids feel like they have everything. They have a mom and they have a dad who get along and who are both there for them. \u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Louis+C.K.+On+His+%27Louie%27+Hiatus%3A+%27I+Wanted+The+Show+To+Feel+New+Again%27&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "The comic tells \u003cem>Fresh Air\u003c/em> that after Season 3, he \"aggressively forgot the show existed for a few months.\" Then he got back to work. \u003cem>Louie\u003c/em> is now in its fourth season.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Louis C.K. is now commonly acknowledged as one of the greatest comics of his generation. His celebrated FX series, \u003cem>Louie,\u003c/em> started its fourth season a couple weeks ago, after a 19-month hiatus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Louis C.K. created, writes, directs and stars in the series as a standup comic named Louie, who, like Louis C.K., is the divorced father of two young girls and shares custody with their mother. Last year, Louis C.K. also had prominent roles in two films: Woody Allen’s \u003cem>Blue Jasmine\u003c/em> and David O. Russell’s \u003cem>American Hustle\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Louis C.K. joins \u003cem>Fresh Air\u003c/em>‘s Terry Gross to discuss raising his daughters as a divorced dad and facing tough audiences.\u003c/p>\n\u003chr>\n\u003ch3>\u003cstrong>Interview Highlights\u003c/strong>\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>On the indefinite hiatus he took between Seasons 3 and 4 of \u003cem>Louie\u003c/em>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I wanted the show to feel new again. I felt like I did three seasons that were all one spurt, and that felt good and I wanted to forget the show, so I took time to forget about it. I aggressively forgot the show existed for a few months. I went on tour and did standup and did other work. I acted in some movies. … Then after about only really a month off, like vacation, I started to think about the show again and think about the first episode being like a pilot again. That’s the way I approached this season: do a show that’s brand new, even though I’m bringing back characters. I tried to start from scratch. I spent way more time writing the show than I ever have before, thinking of the stories and plotting them out. I spent a year doing the season; instead, usually I spend about six months or less from the beginning of the writing to the end of the writing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>On the troubled women that his character dates in the show\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It sort of became a trend after a couple of seasons. What’s fun to do with this guy on the show is just put stuff in front of him that he can’t resist: Here’s a beautiful woman and she doesn’t seem like a good choice for you, but there you go. I think I’m trying to beat something into his head. …\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I like showing a guy deal with bad choices. To me the show wouldn’t be very interesting if I was confronted with all very well balanced women, and then we go and have coffee and everything works out well and maybe we kiss and that’s the end of the episode. That’s not that funny to me. I’ve been playing that game over and over again for a while because it’s still fun for me; that’s why I’m still telling that story of the messed-up woman. It certainly doesn’t represent to me that that’s what women are like. To me it’s funny when people want a show to be an ideal of this-is-what-we-all-feel-is-the-best-version-of-a-woman and –a-man. I’m looking for weaknesses on both sides — it’s fun. But this season, I sort of try to fall in love for real and have a more real relationship.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>On the uncomfortable topics of his standup routine \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The areas I’m going into are touchy. Maybe there’s a God; maybe there isn’t. Is God divorced? Did God kill his wife? You feel a little sweat on the back of your neck when you get there, but if you stay there for a second, you can find something joyful and funny in it. And it’s such a great thing to go to a scary place and laugh. I mean, what’s better than that? …\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I just couldn’t help straying into these areas. It’s a little [mischievous]. I just want to go over there and see if there’s anything there. That’s just always been my nature. … I’m also not afraid of it. I’m not afraid if I go somewhere and I upset everybody. I’ve been there. I guess I was in trouble a lot when I was a kid, so I got used to it. When you’re never in trouble, you can never go to places like that. … I know I can survive everybody being pissed off at me. So when I started going onstage, I realized if I talk about this stuff I might upset people in the room, but it’s worth it because maybe there’s something there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>On building his onstage confidence\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There really isn’t a situation onstage that I feel like I won’t know how to handle. There’s some that I know that I can’t overcome. There are things where I’m like, “This crowd is just not gonna like me,” but I also have a plan for that. You have to stay cool. You can’t let them change your plan. … I have that confidence onstage. I know even if I don’t open well, it’ll be OK; even if I lose them, I’ll get them back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When I was first starting in New York, they had prom shows where they’d fill the audience with kids that were just at their prom and they’re all drunk on limousine booze and as soon as you get onstage, they start yelling at you, before they decide if they like you or not. They boo you when you hit the stage. I used to eat prom shows for dinner. I used to book as many prom shows as I could. First of all, they paid twice as much money — it’s the only time comedy clubs are compassionate to comedians. … But I’ve been onstage with people yelling and booing and throwing stuff at me and I’ve hung in there. I know how to handle that, so nothing scares me now onstage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>On being divorced with two children\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There is a version of divorced life where you’re partners and you’re both taking care of the kids, the kids are spending equal time with each parent, and there’s balance and there’s harmony between the parents because they’re not married in a bad marriage anymore. If you do it right, it’s a much better life for the kids. I was determined to make sure that my kids still felt me in their lives after divorce. And then I was astonished to find out that they wanted to be with me all the time, that this was positive for them. … And also that motivated me to make a good life for myself so that the kids would have a good home when they came to my place. And their mom is a good co-parent; we’re good partners together, we’re friends and we’ve both I think done a pretty good job of letting the kids feel like they have everything. They have a mom and they have a dad who get along and who are both there for them. \u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Louis+C.K.+On+His+%27Louie%27+Hiatus%3A+%27I+Wanted+The+Show+To+Feel+New+Again%27&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>Just who’s to blame for the childhood obesity epidemic? Over the years, the finger has been pointed at parents, video games, Happy Meals and the hamburgers in the school cafeteria.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A new documentary, \u003cem>Fed Up\u003c/em>, alleges it all boils down to a simple substance most of us consume every day: sugar. The pushers of “the new tobacco,” according to the film, are the food industry and our own government.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With a mix of dramatic music, scary soundbites and powerful images of kids injecting insulin into their chubby tummies, \u003cem>Fed Up\u003c/em> argues that the children are not to blame. For the rising number of overweight and obese kids, the mantra of “eat less, move more” is an impossible goal. They simply can’t circumvent the onslaught of marketing that has made them into junk-food junkies, the film says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What if our whole approach to this epidemic has been dead wrong?” the film’s narrator, TV journalist Katie Couric, says in the film’s opening.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hoping to do for childhood obesity what \u003cem>An Inconvenient Truth\u003c/em> did for climate change, \u003ca href=\"http://fedupmovie.com/#/page/home\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Fed Up\u003c/a> takes on the U.S. Department of Agriculture, first lady Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move” campaign and Big Food: Coca Cola, Nestle, Kraft and Kellogg, to name a few. Laurie David, who produced the Oscar-winning \u003cem>An Inconvenient Truth\u003c/em>, is executive producer along with Couric; \u003ca href=\"http://www.imdb.com/name/nm3253001/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Stephanie Soechtig\u003c/a> is the director.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The film sometimes resorts to hyperbole to describe the obesity epidemic and its related health costs, but the message is backed up with sobering statistics and the history of the policies that got us here.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://www.cbsnews.com/news/in-the-us-childhood-obesity-is-a-heavy-burden/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Childhood obesity rates\u003c/a> have grown exponentially in the past 30 years. And they’ve tracked with the huge increase in sugar added to packaged food to make it “hyper-palatable,” as one scientist says, during the \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2014/03/28/295332576/why-we-got-fatter-during-the-fat-free-food-boom\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">low-fat craze\u003c/a> of the 1980s and 1990s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>All the while, the food and beverage lobby spent millions winning political battle after political battle to defend their place in the market, as Reuters \u003ca href=\"http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/27/us-usa-foodlobby-idUSBRE83Q0ED20120427\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">reported\u003c/a> in 2012.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The film features scientist-doctors like \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2013/02/28/173170149/sugars-role-in-rise-of-diabetes-gets-clearer\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Robert Lustig\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2014/04/15/301473319/wheres-the-whole-grain-in-most-of-our-wheat-bread\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">David Ludwig\u003c/a>, and real food advocates like Michael Pollan, Marion Nestle and Mark Bittman. Couric also takes Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack to task, as well as former President Bill Clinton, for failing to combat the problem during his administration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the film’s true stars are several overweight children who are trying — and failing — to lose weight. It’s heartbreaking to watch as the kids tape private video diaries of their struggles, with fears of death and tears of frustration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I want people to know that childhood obesity isn’t as simple as TV and press make it seem … and even Mrs. Obama,” says a tearful Maggie Valentine, a 12-year-old girl who weighs more than 200 pounds. “No matter how hard you try, it’s always going to be an ongoing battle.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The food industry, which got a lashing from the film \u003cem>Food, Inc.\u003c/em>, is already fighting the message of\u003cem> Fed Up\u003c/em>, despite its still limited release.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10136356\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 400px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/fed-up-2-21d68d916c3da23b9edd062562a3223359a6781a.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/fed-up-2-21d68d916c3da23b9edd062562a3223359a6781a-400x300.jpg\" alt=\"A list of individuals and organizations who declined to be interviewed by the filmmakers of Fed Up.\" width=\"400\" height=\"300\" class=\"size-thumbnail wp-image-10136356\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/fed-up-2-21d68d916c3da23b9edd062562a3223359a6781a-400x300.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/fed-up-2-21d68d916c3da23b9edd062562a3223359a6781a-300x225.jpg 300w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/fed-up-2-21d68d916c3da23b9edd062562a3223359a6781a.jpg 724w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 400px) 100vw, 400px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A list of individuals and organizations who declined to be interviewed by the filmmakers of Fed Up. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Radius TWC)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The loudest cry is coming from the Grocery Manufacturers Association, which has launched a website called \u003ca href=\"http://fedupfacts.com/\">Fed Up Facts\u003c/a> that mimics the plate-and-menu graphics of the documentary’s website. It claims, among other things, that childhood obesity rates have dropped by as much as 43 percent, and obesity rates overall have plateaued.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A spokeswoman for the Grocery Manufacturers Association, which is also the lead in \u003ca href=\"http://harvestpublicmedia.org/content/bill-bar-gmo-labeling-unveiled#.U3TkNyg3PZg\">fighting state’s GMO labeling\u003c/a> efforts, did not respond to The Salt’s request for comment on the film.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"http://www.foodintegrity.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Center for Food Integrity\u003c/a>, a Kansas City-based nonprofit that gets funding from dairy, soybean, poultry and pork producers and companies like ConAgra, Monsanto and Tyson, is also preparing to battle the message of \u003cem>Fed Up\u003c/em>. The group’s \u003ca href=\"http://www.cfiengage.com/archive/post/documentary-fed-up\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">talking points and social media tips\u003c/a> urge farmers to engage in what it calls “values-based discussions about today’s food system.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Terry Fleck, executive director of the Center for Food Integrity, tells The Salt that the film errs in singling out sugar as the culprit in childhood obesity. And many companies like Nestle and General Mills are already reducing sugar in products like breakfast cereals, he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Obesity is this reality that we are consuming more calories than we are burning off, and that’s easy to do in our society,” Fleck says. “The reality is we are a society that’s busy. We want convenience foods. We drive everywhere. We don’t walk like others in other cultures.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://www.eatdrinkpolitics.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Michele Simon\u003c/a>, a public health lawyer who appears in \u003cem>Fed Up\u003c/em>, says it’s becoming increasingly common for companies to create “front groups” to try to help shape the public discourse. She \u003ca href=\"http://www.centerforfoodsafety.org/files/front_groups_final_84531.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">names\u003c/a> the Center for Food Integrity as one such group.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What’s going on here is that the food industry has a credibility problem,” Simon says. “So they funnel their money into these front groups that can look like they’re doing this with the sheen of credibility — and sometimes even scientists — that are bringing the industry messages into the public discourse.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The public discourse, Simon says, is finally questioning whether individuals are to blame when it comes to childhood obesity\u003cem>. Fed Up\u003c/em> will help that conversation, she says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The film concludes with a list of the 20 companies, industry groups and politicians who refused to talk to the producers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Peggy Lowe is a reporter for \u003ca href=\"http://harvestpublicmedia.org/\">Harvest Public Media\u003c/a>. \u003c/em> \u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=%27Fed+Up%27+Portrays+Obese+Kids+As+Victims+In+A+Sugar-Coated+World&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Just who’s to blame for the childhood obesity epidemic? Over the years, the finger has been pointed at parents, video games, Happy Meals and the hamburgers in the school cafeteria.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A new documentary, \u003cem>Fed Up\u003c/em>, alleges it all boils down to a simple substance most of us consume every day: sugar. The pushers of “the new tobacco,” according to the film, are the food industry and our own government.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With a mix of dramatic music, scary soundbites and powerful images of kids injecting insulin into their chubby tummies, \u003cem>Fed Up\u003c/em> argues that the children are not to blame. For the rising number of overweight and obese kids, the mantra of “eat less, move more” is an impossible goal. They simply can’t circumvent the onslaught of marketing that has made them into junk-food junkies, the film says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What if our whole approach to this epidemic has been dead wrong?” the film’s narrator, TV journalist Katie Couric, says in the film’s opening.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hoping to do for childhood obesity what \u003cem>An Inconvenient Truth\u003c/em> did for climate change, \u003ca href=\"http://fedupmovie.com/#/page/home\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Fed Up\u003c/a> takes on the U.S. Department of Agriculture, first lady Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move” campaign and Big Food: Coca Cola, Nestle, Kraft and Kellogg, to name a few. Laurie David, who produced the Oscar-winning \u003cem>An Inconvenient Truth\u003c/em>, is executive producer along with Couric; \u003ca href=\"http://www.imdb.com/name/nm3253001/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Stephanie Soechtig\u003c/a> is the director.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The film sometimes resorts to hyperbole to describe the obesity epidemic and its related health costs, but the message is backed up with sobering statistics and the history of the policies that got us here.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://www.cbsnews.com/news/in-the-us-childhood-obesity-is-a-heavy-burden/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Childhood obesity rates\u003c/a> have grown exponentially in the past 30 years. And they’ve tracked with the huge increase in sugar added to packaged food to make it “hyper-palatable,” as one scientist says, during the \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2014/03/28/295332576/why-we-got-fatter-during-the-fat-free-food-boom\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">low-fat craze\u003c/a> of the 1980s and 1990s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>All the while, the food and beverage lobby spent millions winning political battle after political battle to defend their place in the market, as Reuters \u003ca href=\"http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/27/us-usa-foodlobby-idUSBRE83Q0ED20120427\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">reported\u003c/a> in 2012.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The film features scientist-doctors like \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2013/02/28/173170149/sugars-role-in-rise-of-diabetes-gets-clearer\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Robert Lustig\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2014/04/15/301473319/wheres-the-whole-grain-in-most-of-our-wheat-bread\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">David Ludwig\u003c/a>, and real food advocates like Michael Pollan, Marion Nestle and Mark Bittman. Couric also takes Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack to task, as well as former President Bill Clinton, for failing to combat the problem during his administration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the film’s true stars are several overweight children who are trying — and failing — to lose weight. It’s heartbreaking to watch as the kids tape private video diaries of their struggles, with fears of death and tears of frustration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I want people to know that childhood obesity isn’t as simple as TV and press make it seem … and even Mrs. Obama,” says a tearful Maggie Valentine, a 12-year-old girl who weighs more than 200 pounds. “No matter how hard you try, it’s always going to be an ongoing battle.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The food industry, which got a lashing from the film \u003cem>Food, Inc.\u003c/em>, is already fighting the message of\u003cem> Fed Up\u003c/em>, despite its still limited release.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10136356\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 400px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/fed-up-2-21d68d916c3da23b9edd062562a3223359a6781a.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/fed-up-2-21d68d916c3da23b9edd062562a3223359a6781a-400x300.jpg\" alt=\"A list of individuals and organizations who declined to be interviewed by the filmmakers of Fed Up.\" width=\"400\" height=\"300\" class=\"size-thumbnail wp-image-10136356\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/fed-up-2-21d68d916c3da23b9edd062562a3223359a6781a-400x300.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/fed-up-2-21d68d916c3da23b9edd062562a3223359a6781a-300x225.jpg 300w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/fed-up-2-21d68d916c3da23b9edd062562a3223359a6781a.jpg 724w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 400px) 100vw, 400px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A list of individuals and organizations who declined to be interviewed by the filmmakers of Fed Up. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Radius TWC)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The loudest cry is coming from the Grocery Manufacturers Association, which has launched a website called \u003ca href=\"http://fedupfacts.com/\">Fed Up Facts\u003c/a> that mimics the plate-and-menu graphics of the documentary’s website. It claims, among other things, that childhood obesity rates have dropped by as much as 43 percent, and obesity rates overall have plateaued.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A spokeswoman for the Grocery Manufacturers Association, which is also the lead in \u003ca href=\"http://harvestpublicmedia.org/content/bill-bar-gmo-labeling-unveiled#.U3TkNyg3PZg\">fighting state’s GMO labeling\u003c/a> efforts, did not respond to The Salt’s request for comment on the film.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"http://www.foodintegrity.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Center for Food Integrity\u003c/a>, a Kansas City-based nonprofit that gets funding from dairy, soybean, poultry and pork producers and companies like ConAgra, Monsanto and Tyson, is also preparing to battle the message of \u003cem>Fed Up\u003c/em>. The group’s \u003ca href=\"http://www.cfiengage.com/archive/post/documentary-fed-up\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">talking points and social media tips\u003c/a> urge farmers to engage in what it calls “values-based discussions about today’s food system.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Terry Fleck, executive director of the Center for Food Integrity, tells The Salt that the film errs in singling out sugar as the culprit in childhood obesity. And many companies like Nestle and General Mills are already reducing sugar in products like breakfast cereals, he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Obesity is this reality that we are consuming more calories than we are burning off, and that’s easy to do in our society,” Fleck says. “The reality is we are a society that’s busy. We want convenience foods. We drive everywhere. We don’t walk like others in other cultures.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://www.eatdrinkpolitics.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Michele Simon\u003c/a>, a public health lawyer who appears in \u003cem>Fed Up\u003c/em>, says it’s becoming increasingly common for companies to create “front groups” to try to help shape the public discourse. She \u003ca href=\"http://www.centerforfoodsafety.org/files/front_groups_final_84531.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">names\u003c/a> the Center for Food Integrity as one such group.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What’s going on here is that the food industry has a credibility problem,” Simon says. “So they funnel their money into these front groups that can look like they’re doing this with the sheen of credibility — and sometimes even scientists — that are bringing the industry messages into the public discourse.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The public discourse, Simon says, is finally questioning whether individuals are to blame when it comes to childhood obesity\u003cem>. Fed Up\u003c/em> will help that conversation, she says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The film concludes with a list of the 20 companies, industry groups and politicians who refused to talk to the producers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Peggy Lowe is a reporter for \u003ca href=\"http://harvestpublicmedia.org/\">Harvest Public Media\u003c/a>. \u003c/em> \u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=%27Fed+Up%27+Portrays+Obese+Kids+As+Victims+In+A+Sugar-Coated+World&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"slug": "gordon-willis-cinematographer-who-gave-woody-allen-films-their-look-dies",
"title": "Gordon Willis, Woody Allen's Cinematographer, Dies",
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"content": "\u003cp>Gordon Willis, the cinematographer behind such classic 1970s films as \u003cem>Annie Hall\u003c/em>, \u003cem>Klute\u003c/em>, \u003cem>All the President’s Men\u003c/em> and the \u003cem>Godfather\u003c/em> series, died on Sunday. He was 82.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“One cinematographer had established a kind of noir color look, rich in brown, amber and shadow, that was a vital force in the noir movies made in Hollywood in the 1970s,” film historian David Thomson wrote of Willis in his \u003cem>New Biographical Dictionary of Film\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Willis won an honorary Academy Award in 2009, but never took home the prize for best cinematography. He was nominated twice, for \u003cem>The Godfather Part III\u003c/em> and \u003cem>Zelig\u003c/em>, but not for the earlier works that had established him as a giant among his peers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For a while, I really didn’t know what to do with that movie,” he said of the original \u003cem>Godfather\u003c/em> in a 2002 \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=120386781\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">interview\u003c/a> on NPR’s \u003cem>Fresh Air\u003c/em>. “I finally decided this should have this brassy, yellow look to it. Don’t ask me why. It just felt right.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The New York native got his start working in makeup. He worked on documentaries for a motion picture unit as part of his Air Force service during the Korean War.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He shot a total of eight films for Woody Allen and was dubbed the “Prince of Darkness” by fellow cinematographer Conrad Hall for his use of shadows. (Think of the scene in Allen’s \u003cem>Manhattan\u003c/em> where he and Diane Keaton duck out of the rain into the American Museum of Natural History, or the garage scenes in \u003cem>All the President’s Men\u003c/em>.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He’s an artist,” Allen \u003ca href=\"http://www.people.com/people/archive/article/0,,20086223,00.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">told\u003c/a> \u003cem>People\u003c/em> in 1983. “He’s got a great sense of humor. He taught me a lot.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Willis’ last film was \u003cem>The Devil’s Own\u003c/em> in 1997, directed by Alan J. Pakula.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I got tired of trying to get actors out of trailers, and standing in the rain,” Willis said. \u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Gordon+Willis%2C+Cinematographer+Who+Gave+Woody+Allen+Films+Their+Look%2C+Dies&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Gordon Willis, the cinematographer behind such classic 1970s films as \u003cem>Annie Hall\u003c/em>, \u003cem>Klute\u003c/em>, \u003cem>All the President’s Men\u003c/em> and the \u003cem>Godfather\u003c/em> series, died on Sunday. He was 82.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“One cinematographer had established a kind of noir color look, rich in brown, amber and shadow, that was a vital force in the noir movies made in Hollywood in the 1970s,” film historian David Thomson wrote of Willis in his \u003cem>New Biographical Dictionary of Film\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Willis won an honorary Academy Award in 2009, but never took home the prize for best cinematography. He was nominated twice, for \u003cem>The Godfather Part III\u003c/em> and \u003cem>Zelig\u003c/em>, but not for the earlier works that had established him as a giant among his peers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For a while, I really didn’t know what to do with that movie,” he said of the original \u003cem>Godfather\u003c/em> in a 2002 \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=120386781\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">interview\u003c/a> on NPR’s \u003cem>Fresh Air\u003c/em>. “I finally decided this should have this brassy, yellow look to it. Don’t ask me why. It just felt right.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The New York native got his start working in makeup. He worked on documentaries for a motion picture unit as part of his Air Force service during the Korean War.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He shot a total of eight films for Woody Allen and was dubbed the “Prince of Darkness” by fellow cinematographer Conrad Hall for his use of shadows. (Think of the scene in Allen’s \u003cem>Manhattan\u003c/em> where he and Diane Keaton duck out of the rain into the American Museum of Natural History, or the garage scenes in \u003cem>All the President’s Men\u003c/em>.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He’s an artist,” Allen \u003ca href=\"http://www.people.com/people/archive/article/0,,20086223,00.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">told\u003c/a> \u003cem>People\u003c/em> in 1983. “He’s got a great sense of humor. He taught me a lot.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Willis’ last film was \u003cem>The Devil’s Own\u003c/em> in 1997, directed by Alan J. Pakula.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I got tired of trying to get actors out of trailers, and standing in the rain,” Willis said. \u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Gordon+Willis%2C+Cinematographer+Who+Gave+Woody+Allen+Films+Their+Look%2C+Dies&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Artist Kara Walker Draws Us into Bitter History with Something Sweet",
"headTitle": "Artist Kara Walker Draws Us into Bitter History with Something Sweet | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>Kara Walker was barely out of art school when she won a MacArthur Foundation genius grant, in 1997. Back then, her early work shocked audiences in part because her murals looked so charming from a distance. Black paper shadow portraits of colonial figures seemed to dance on white gallery walls; but lean in and you’d find your nose pressed up against images of slavery’s horrors — mammies, masters, lynchings and sexual violence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In other words, Walker is used to filling a room. But this spring she was asked to fill a warehouse — the abandoned Domino Sugar factory in New York. It’s about to be leveled to make way for condos and offices, but before it goes, Walker was asked to use this cavernous, urban ruin for something special.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Walker took me on a tour of the show a day before it opened. The factory is covered in sugar — it almost looks like insulation or burnt cotton candy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s a little bit sticky in some areas …” she says. “There’s sugar caked up in the rafters.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10136272\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164457-e474894fcf4b4667400e3dac15331d26936f5038.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-10136272\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164457-e474894fcf4b4667400e3dac15331d26936f5038-1440x1079.jpg\" alt='Visitors wait in line for the Kara Walker exhibit on May 10, opening day. The show was housed in a former Domino Sugar refinery. Inside, visitors described the building as \"cathedral-like\" and \"creepy,\" and said it smelled like a bakery' width=\"640\" height=\"479\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164457-e474894fcf4b4667400e3dac15331d26936f5038-1440x1079.jpg 1440w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164457-e474894fcf4b4667400e3dac15331d26936f5038-400x299.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164457-e474894fcf4b4667400e3dac15331d26936f5038-300x224.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Visitors wait in line for the Kara Walker exhibit on May 10, opening day. The show was housed in a former Domino Sugar refinery. Inside, visitors described the building as “cathedral-like” and “creepy,” and said it smelled like a bakery \u003ccite>(Andrew Burton/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>I was so busy trying not to get molasses on my shoes that when I turn the corner, I’m stunned. There in the middle of this dark hall is a bright, white sphinx. The effect is the opposite of those white walled galleries; a dark space and a towering white sculpture made of — what else? — sugar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What we’re seeing, for lack of a better term, is the head of a woman who has very African, black features,” Walker explains. “She sits somewhere in between the kind of mammy figure of old and something a little bit more recognizable — recognizably human. … [She has] very full lips; high cheek bones; eyes that have no eyes, [that] seem to be either looking out or closed; and a kerchief on her head. She’s positioned with her arms flat out across the ground and large breasts that are staring at you.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Walker has dreamed up a “subtlety” — that’s what sugar sculptures were called in medieval times. They were a luxury confectioners created for special occasions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To understand where all this is going, you need look no further than Walker’s teasingly long title for the show: “A Subtlety or the Marvelous Sugar Baby an Homage to the unpaid and overworked Artisans who have refined our Sweet tastes from the cane fields to the Kitchens of the New World on the Occasion of the demolition of the Domino Sugar Refining Plant.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I know, it’s a mouth full. But Walker has this wide smile and as she sweeps her hands around in broad gestures, white tides of sugar dust ripple at the edge of her feet — and she sells it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was very fun and childlike to, you know, have your hands in a bucket full of sugar, or a 50-pound bag of sugar, throwing it out onto the floor,” she says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10136274\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164441-b3c9e890250d13f3fc8a13b3014096b8793aaa07.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-10136274\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164441-b3c9e890250d13f3fc8a13b3014096b8793aaa07-1440x1080.jpg\" alt=\"Walker's candy boy sculptures started melting fast in the non-climate-controlled factory, and the result looks a lot like blood\" width=\"640\" height=\"480\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164441-b3c9e890250d13f3fc8a13b3014096b8793aaa07-1440x1080.jpg 1440w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164441-b3c9e890250d13f3fc8a13b3014096b8793aaa07-400x300.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164441-b3c9e890250d13f3fc8a13b3014096b8793aaa07-300x225.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Walker’s candy boy sculptures started melting fast in the non-climate-controlled factory, and the result looks a lot like blood \u003ccite>(Andrew Burton/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>She’s doing what she does best: drawing you in with something sweet, something almost charming, before you realize you’ve admired something disturbing. In this case, that’s the horror-riddled Caribbean slave trade that helped fuel the industrial gains of the 18th and 19th centuries; a slave trade built to profit from an insatiable Western market for refined sugar treats and rum.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Basically, it was blood sugar” Walker says. “Like we talk about blood diamonds today, there were pamphlets saying this sugar has blood on its hands.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She explains that to make the sugar, the cane had to be fed into large mills by hand. It was a dangerous process: Slaves lost hands, arms, limbs and lives.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve been kind of back and forth with my reverence for sugar,” Walkers says. “Like, how we’re all kind of invested in its production without really realizing just what goes into it; how much chemistry goes into extracting whiteness from the sugar cane.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Walker went down a rabbit hole of sugar history, at one point stumbling onto some black figurines online — the type of racial tchotchkes that turn up in a sea of mammy cookie jars. They were ceramic, brown-skinned boys carrying baskets. Those were the size of dolls, but Walker’s are 5 feet high, some made entirely of molasses-colored candy. Fifteen of them are posed throughout the factory floor, leading the way to her sugar sphinx.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The boys are cute and apple-cheeked, but they’re also kind of scary — some of the melted candy looks a lot like blood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10136275\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164445-67fc8ed75a3e4c29fea51aa47a2b4bcca391c626.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-10136275\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164445-67fc8ed75a3e4c29fea51aa47a2b4bcca391c626-1440x1079.jpg\" alt=\"The candy sculptures have been disintegrating so fast that Walker began throwing pieces of the broken boys into the baskets of the ones that are still standing.\" width=\"640\" height=\"479\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164445-67fc8ed75a3e4c29fea51aa47a2b4bcca391c626-1440x1079.jpg 1440w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164445-67fc8ed75a3e4c29fea51aa47a2b4bcca391c626-400x299.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164445-67fc8ed75a3e4c29fea51aa47a2b4bcca391c626-300x224.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The candy sculptures have been disintegrating so fast that Walker began throwing pieces of the broken boys into the baskets of the ones that are still standing. \u003ccite>(Andrew Burton/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“I knew that the candy ones wouldn’t last,” Walker says. “That was part of the point was that they were going to be in this non-climate-controlled space, slowly melting away and disintegrating. But what’s happened is we lost two of these guys in the last two days or so.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Losing those figures in service of the sugar is the slave trade in a nutshell.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Also in a nutshell,” Walker says, “and maybe a little bit hammer-over-the-head, is that some of the pieces of the broken boys I threw into the baskets of the unbroken boys.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>OK, that’s not so subtle, but it’s also not unusual for Kara Walker. She’s dressed in a shiny oversized baseball jacket emblazoned with the gold face of King Tut on it. I ask her if at a certain point she worries about doing work that is seen as being \u003cem>just\u003c/em> about race.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I don’t really see it as just about race,” she says. “I mean, I think that my work is about trying to get a grasp on history. I mean, I guess it’s just kind of a trap, in a way, that I decided to set my foot into early on, which is the trap of race — to say that it’s about race when it’s kind of about this larger concern about being.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I tell her it’s almost impossible to talk about our history without talking about race. She replies: “There [are] scholarly conversations about race and then there’s the kind of meaty, unresolved, mucky blood lust of talking about race where I always feel like the conversation is inconclusive.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Inconclusive, but for artist Kara Walker, ongoing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10136273\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/panorama1_lowsmall_enl-00c30c22c6f0e07d23f3799914f4e689c40f6201.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-10136273\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/panorama1_lowsmall_enl-00c30c22c6f0e07d23f3799914f4e689c40f6201-1440x552.jpg\" alt=\"Kara Walker's <em>A Subtlety</em> stretches 75.5 feet long, 35.5 feet tall and 26 feet wide.\" width=\"800\" height=\"307\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/panorama1_lowsmall_enl-00c30c22c6f0e07d23f3799914f4e689c40f6201-1440x552.jpg 1440w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/panorama1_lowsmall_enl-00c30c22c6f0e07d23f3799914f4e689c40f6201-400x153.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/panorama1_lowsmall_enl-00c30c22c6f0e07d23f3799914f4e689c40f6201-300x115.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kara Walker’s \u003cem>A Subtlety\u003c/em> stretches 75.5 feet long, 35.5 feet tall and 26 feet wide. \u003ccite>(Andrew Burton/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Artist+Kara+Walker+Draws+Us+Into+Bitter+History+With+Something+Sweet&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\" alt=\"\">\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Kara Walker was barely out of art school when she won a MacArthur Foundation genius grant, in 1997. Back then, her early work shocked audiences in part because her murals looked so charming from a distance. Black paper shadow portraits of colonial figures seemed to dance on white gallery walls; but lean in and you’d find your nose pressed up against images of slavery’s horrors — mammies, masters, lynchings and sexual violence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In other words, Walker is used to filling a room. But this spring she was asked to fill a warehouse — the abandoned Domino Sugar factory in New York. It’s about to be leveled to make way for condos and offices, but before it goes, Walker was asked to use this cavernous, urban ruin for something special.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Walker took me on a tour of the show a day before it opened. The factory is covered in sugar — it almost looks like insulation or burnt cotton candy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s a little bit sticky in some areas …” she says. “There’s sugar caked up in the rafters.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10136272\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164457-e474894fcf4b4667400e3dac15331d26936f5038.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-10136272\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164457-e474894fcf4b4667400e3dac15331d26936f5038-1440x1079.jpg\" alt='Visitors wait in line for the Kara Walker exhibit on May 10, opening day. The show was housed in a former Domino Sugar refinery. Inside, visitors described the building as \"cathedral-like\" and \"creepy,\" and said it smelled like a bakery' width=\"640\" height=\"479\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164457-e474894fcf4b4667400e3dac15331d26936f5038-1440x1079.jpg 1440w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164457-e474894fcf4b4667400e3dac15331d26936f5038-400x299.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164457-e474894fcf4b4667400e3dac15331d26936f5038-300x224.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Visitors wait in line for the Kara Walker exhibit on May 10, opening day. The show was housed in a former Domino Sugar refinery. Inside, visitors described the building as “cathedral-like” and “creepy,” and said it smelled like a bakery \u003ccite>(Andrew Burton/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>I was so busy trying not to get molasses on my shoes that when I turn the corner, I’m stunned. There in the middle of this dark hall is a bright, white sphinx. The effect is the opposite of those white walled galleries; a dark space and a towering white sculpture made of — what else? — sugar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What we’re seeing, for lack of a better term, is the head of a woman who has very African, black features,” Walker explains. “She sits somewhere in between the kind of mammy figure of old and something a little bit more recognizable — recognizably human. … [She has] very full lips; high cheek bones; eyes that have no eyes, [that] seem to be either looking out or closed; and a kerchief on her head. She’s positioned with her arms flat out across the ground and large breasts that are staring at you.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Walker has dreamed up a “subtlety” — that’s what sugar sculptures were called in medieval times. They were a luxury confectioners created for special occasions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To understand where all this is going, you need look no further than Walker’s teasingly long title for the show: “A Subtlety or the Marvelous Sugar Baby an Homage to the unpaid and overworked Artisans who have refined our Sweet tastes from the cane fields to the Kitchens of the New World on the Occasion of the demolition of the Domino Sugar Refining Plant.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I know, it’s a mouth full. But Walker has this wide smile and as she sweeps her hands around in broad gestures, white tides of sugar dust ripple at the edge of her feet — and she sells it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was very fun and childlike to, you know, have your hands in a bucket full of sugar, or a 50-pound bag of sugar, throwing it out onto the floor,” she says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10136274\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164441-b3c9e890250d13f3fc8a13b3014096b8793aaa07.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-10136274\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164441-b3c9e890250d13f3fc8a13b3014096b8793aaa07-1440x1080.jpg\" alt=\"Walker's candy boy sculptures started melting fast in the non-climate-controlled factory, and the result looks a lot like blood\" width=\"640\" height=\"480\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164441-b3c9e890250d13f3fc8a13b3014096b8793aaa07-1440x1080.jpg 1440w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164441-b3c9e890250d13f3fc8a13b3014096b8793aaa07-400x300.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164441-b3c9e890250d13f3fc8a13b3014096b8793aaa07-300x225.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Walker’s candy boy sculptures started melting fast in the non-climate-controlled factory, and the result looks a lot like blood \u003ccite>(Andrew Burton/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>She’s doing what she does best: drawing you in with something sweet, something almost charming, before you realize you’ve admired something disturbing. In this case, that’s the horror-riddled Caribbean slave trade that helped fuel the industrial gains of the 18th and 19th centuries; a slave trade built to profit from an insatiable Western market for refined sugar treats and rum.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Basically, it was blood sugar” Walker says. “Like we talk about blood diamonds today, there were pamphlets saying this sugar has blood on its hands.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She explains that to make the sugar, the cane had to be fed into large mills by hand. It was a dangerous process: Slaves lost hands, arms, limbs and lives.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve been kind of back and forth with my reverence for sugar,” Walkers says. “Like, how we’re all kind of invested in its production without really realizing just what goes into it; how much chemistry goes into extracting whiteness from the sugar cane.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Walker went down a rabbit hole of sugar history, at one point stumbling onto some black figurines online — the type of racial tchotchkes that turn up in a sea of mammy cookie jars. They were ceramic, brown-skinned boys carrying baskets. Those were the size of dolls, but Walker’s are 5 feet high, some made entirely of molasses-colored candy. Fifteen of them are posed throughout the factory floor, leading the way to her sugar sphinx.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The boys are cute and apple-cheeked, but they’re also kind of scary — some of the melted candy looks a lot like blood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10136275\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164445-67fc8ed75a3e4c29fea51aa47a2b4bcca391c626.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-10136275\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164445-67fc8ed75a3e4c29fea51aa47a2b4bcca391c626-1440x1079.jpg\" alt=\"The candy sculptures have been disintegrating so fast that Walker began throwing pieces of the broken boys into the baskets of the ones that are still standing.\" width=\"640\" height=\"479\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164445-67fc8ed75a3e4c29fea51aa47a2b4bcca391c626-1440x1079.jpg 1440w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164445-67fc8ed75a3e4c29fea51aa47a2b4bcca391c626-400x299.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/489164445-67fc8ed75a3e4c29fea51aa47a2b4bcca391c626-300x224.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The candy sculptures have been disintegrating so fast that Walker began throwing pieces of the broken boys into the baskets of the ones that are still standing. \u003ccite>(Andrew Burton/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“I knew that the candy ones wouldn’t last,” Walker says. “That was part of the point was that they were going to be in this non-climate-controlled space, slowly melting away and disintegrating. But what’s happened is we lost two of these guys in the last two days or so.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Losing those figures in service of the sugar is the slave trade in a nutshell.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Also in a nutshell,” Walker says, “and maybe a little bit hammer-over-the-head, is that some of the pieces of the broken boys I threw into the baskets of the unbroken boys.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>OK, that’s not so subtle, but it’s also not unusual for Kara Walker. She’s dressed in a shiny oversized baseball jacket emblazoned with the gold face of King Tut on it. I ask her if at a certain point she worries about doing work that is seen as being \u003cem>just\u003c/em> about race.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I don’t really see it as just about race,” she says. “I mean, I think that my work is about trying to get a grasp on history. I mean, I guess it’s just kind of a trap, in a way, that I decided to set my foot into early on, which is the trap of race — to say that it’s about race when it’s kind of about this larger concern about being.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I tell her it’s almost impossible to talk about our history without talking about race. She replies: “There [are] scholarly conversations about race and then there’s the kind of meaty, unresolved, mucky blood lust of talking about race where I always feel like the conversation is inconclusive.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Inconclusive, but for artist Kara Walker, ongoing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10136273\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/panorama1_lowsmall_enl-00c30c22c6f0e07d23f3799914f4e689c40f6201.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-10136273\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/panorama1_lowsmall_enl-00c30c22c6f0e07d23f3799914f4e689c40f6201-1440x552.jpg\" alt=\"Kara Walker's <em>A Subtlety</em> stretches 75.5 feet long, 35.5 feet tall and 26 feet wide.\" width=\"800\" height=\"307\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/panorama1_lowsmall_enl-00c30c22c6f0e07d23f3799914f4e689c40f6201-1440x552.jpg 1440w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/panorama1_lowsmall_enl-00c30c22c6f0e07d23f3799914f4e689c40f6201-400x153.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/panorama1_lowsmall_enl-00c30c22c6f0e07d23f3799914f4e689c40f6201-300x115.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kara Walker’s \u003cem>A Subtlety\u003c/em> stretches 75.5 feet long, 35.5 feet tall and 26 feet wide. \u003ccite>(Andrew Burton/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Artist+Kara+Walker+Draws+Us+Into+Bitter+History+With+Something+Sweet&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\" alt=\"\">\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "'Million Dollar Arm' is a Sales Pitch in Search of Stillness",
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"content": "\u003cp>Where does Don Draper’s formidable presence come from in \u003cem>Mad Men\u003c/em>? From his impeccable style, sure, and from his brooding good looks, of course, but also from his stillness. A few drug-induced exceptions aside, Don is as restrained in movement as he is in his speech. The combination gives him an irresistible, if unsettling, allure; in meetings, it’s his solid stare that holds your attention as much as his words.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Jon Hamm’s stillness playing Don in \u003cem>Mad Men\u003c/em> became particularly noticeable after I watched him in \u003cem>Million Dollar Arm\u003c/em>, which, among other things, lacks a noteworthy performance to ground an otherwise loosely-constructed film. Hamm doesn’t play Don in \u003cem>Million Dollar Arm\u003c/em>, of course, but he does play another salesman: the sports agent JB, who, after leaving a large agency to start his own business, is struggling to sign a big name athlete and pay his bills.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In fact, \u003cem>Million Dollar Arm\u003c/em> begins with a pitch from JB to a superstar NFL linebacker he hopes to represent. JB doesn’t quite offer the same satisfactions as Don, though. He’s something closer to Jerry Maguire in need of an editor, concluding his promise to secure countless riches with the supplication: “Will you let me help you do that?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>JB leads a hurried existence, rushing around LA in his Porsche convertible. Eventually he takes that energy to India, where, with the prospect of a billion new baseball fans on his mind, he hopes to save his career by converting Indian cricket bowlers into professional pitchers. To that end, he holds a contest called Million Dollar Arm, offering two finalists an opportunity to try out for the major leagues in the U.S. And when the winners, Rinku (Suraj Sharma) and Dinesh (Madhur Mittal), return with JB to LA, one of the first English words they learn is the essence of JB’s way of life: Hustle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Looking at Hamm’s previous roles, you can chart his range by whether his characters default to a smile or a stone-faced stare. If deadpan, he’s Don—assertive, composed, unflappable. With a smile—which, unlike most things about Hamm, is generally strained and awkward—he flips: now he’s goofy and approachable, characteristics he used to great effect on \u003cem>30 Rock\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Either way, he has presence. In \u003cem>Million Dollar Arm\u003c/em>, he disappears. And he’s not the only one: Between director Craig Gillespie (\u003cem>Lars and the Real Girl\u003c/em>), writer Thomas McCarthy (\u003cem>The Station Agent\u003c/em>), and co-stars Bill Paxton, Alan Arkin, and Lake Bell (who is good enough to make you realize how wasteful her love-interest-as-motherly-sidekick role is), there’s a lot of potential talent subsumed here by plain studio-fare.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003c/em>Whoever you want to blame, \u003cem>Million Dollar Arm\u003c/em> is a film that, like JB, is in a needless rush. This isn’t the hurry of a tense thriller. Instead, with time to kill, the film resembles a long car ride, with McCarthy and Gillespie producing the closest approximations to excitement possible so no one realizes they’re bored. The scenes in India stuff a series of montages in between jokes about animals roaming the streets and a brief, preposterous stop at the Taj Mahal. (A Disney movie isn’t where one ought to search for nuanced multiculturalism, of course, and here, at least, both sides are reduced to stereotypes: America is baseball, luxury, and cultural insensitivity; India is spicy food, crowded streets, and poverty.) In other moments, when a montage is too clearly out of the question, the film resorts to sudden leaps in time: Anything, that is, but a stop for breath.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the end, Hamm is most affected—there’s a strain to his performance that suggests something about JB, perhaps, but also strips the character of any charisma. As a result, \u003cem>Million Dollar Man\u003c/em> may be the first hint that Hamm is unable to rise above mediocre material and demand our attention regardless (an essential feature of any leading Hollywood actor or actress). But before passing judgment, I’d like to see a film that lets him sit still and prove otherwise. \u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=%27Million+Dollar+Arm%27+Is+A+Sales+Pitch+In+Search+Of+Stillness&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Where does Don Draper’s formidable presence come from in \u003cem>Mad Men\u003c/em>? From his impeccable style, sure, and from his brooding good looks, of course, but also from his stillness. A few drug-induced exceptions aside, Don is as restrained in movement as he is in his speech. The combination gives him an irresistible, if unsettling, allure; in meetings, it’s his solid stare that holds your attention as much as his words.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Jon Hamm’s stillness playing Don in \u003cem>Mad Men\u003c/em> became particularly noticeable after I watched him in \u003cem>Million Dollar Arm\u003c/em>, which, among other things, lacks a noteworthy performance to ground an otherwise loosely-constructed film. Hamm doesn’t play Don in \u003cem>Million Dollar Arm\u003c/em>, of course, but he does play another salesman: the sports agent JB, who, after leaving a large agency to start his own business, is struggling to sign a big name athlete and pay his bills.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In fact, \u003cem>Million Dollar Arm\u003c/em> begins with a pitch from JB to a superstar NFL linebacker he hopes to represent. JB doesn’t quite offer the same satisfactions as Don, though. He’s something closer to Jerry Maguire in need of an editor, concluding his promise to secure countless riches with the supplication: “Will you let me help you do that?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>JB leads a hurried existence, rushing around LA in his Porsche convertible. Eventually he takes that energy to India, where, with the prospect of a billion new baseball fans on his mind, he hopes to save his career by converting Indian cricket bowlers into professional pitchers. To that end, he holds a contest called Million Dollar Arm, offering two finalists an opportunity to try out for the major leagues in the U.S. And when the winners, Rinku (Suraj Sharma) and Dinesh (Madhur Mittal), return with JB to LA, one of the first English words they learn is the essence of JB’s way of life: Hustle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Looking at Hamm’s previous roles, you can chart his range by whether his characters default to a smile or a stone-faced stare. If deadpan, he’s Don—assertive, composed, unflappable. With a smile—which, unlike most things about Hamm, is generally strained and awkward—he flips: now he’s goofy and approachable, characteristics he used to great effect on \u003cem>30 Rock\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Either way, he has presence. In \u003cem>Million Dollar Arm\u003c/em>, he disappears. And he’s not the only one: Between director Craig Gillespie (\u003cem>Lars and the Real Girl\u003c/em>), writer Thomas McCarthy (\u003cem>The Station Agent\u003c/em>), and co-stars Bill Paxton, Alan Arkin, and Lake Bell (who is good enough to make you realize how wasteful her love-interest-as-motherly-sidekick role is), there’s a lot of potential talent subsumed here by plain studio-fare.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003c/em>Whoever you want to blame, \u003cem>Million Dollar Arm\u003c/em> is a film that, like JB, is in a needless rush. This isn’t the hurry of a tense thriller. Instead, with time to kill, the film resembles a long car ride, with McCarthy and Gillespie producing the closest approximations to excitement possible so no one realizes they’re bored. The scenes in India stuff a series of montages in between jokes about animals roaming the streets and a brief, preposterous stop at the Taj Mahal. (A Disney movie isn’t where one ought to search for nuanced multiculturalism, of course, and here, at least, both sides are reduced to stereotypes: America is baseball, luxury, and cultural insensitivity; India is spicy food, crowded streets, and poverty.) In other moments, when a montage is too clearly out of the question, the film resorts to sudden leaps in time: Anything, that is, but a stop for breath.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the end, Hamm is most affected—there’s a strain to his performance that suggests something about JB, perhaps, but also strips the character of any charisma. As a result, \u003cem>Million Dollar Man\u003c/em> may be the first hint that Hamm is unable to rise above mediocre material and demand our attention regardless (an essential feature of any leading Hollywood actor or actress). But before passing judgment, I’d like to see a film that lets him sit still and prove otherwise. \u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=%27Million+Dollar+Arm%27+Is+A+Sales+Pitch+In+Search+Of+Stillness&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "A Rational Conversation: How Deep is the Disco Revival?",
"headTitle": "A Rational Conversation: How Deep is the Disco Revival? | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>“A Rational Conversation” is a column by writer \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/ericducker\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cem>Eric Ducker\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> in which he gets on iChat or Gchat or the phone or whatever with a special guest to examine a music-related subject that’s entered the pop culture consciousness. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Recently eurodisco legends \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/GiorgioMoroderOfficial\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cem>Giorgio Moroder\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> and \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"http://www.discogs.com/artist/16127-Cerrone\">\u003cem>Cerrone\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> uncorked the champagne of their sound and re-emerged for some unexpected dance remixes of major rock acts. Moroder took on \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15052810/coldplay\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Coldplay\u003c/a>‘s “Midnight” and \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/211451999/haim\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Haim\u003c/a>‘s “Forever,” while Cerrone went at Haim’s “If I Could Change Your Mind.” All qualify as their highest profile releases in years, if not decades.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>These remixes also seem like part of a larger re-embrace of sophisticated, immaculate disco sounds. This trend is probably best exemplified by \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15414420/daft-punk\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Daft Punk\u003c/a>‘s 2013 album \u003c/em>Random Access Memories\u003cem>, which also featured\u003c/em> \u003cem>producer and composer Moroder delivering the spoken introduction to the tribute track “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5m4ZkEqQrn0&feature=kp\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Giorgio by Moroder\u003c/a>.” Still, disco is a groovier and subtler form of dance music than the currently raging sounds of trap and dubstep, so it’s unclear how much young listeners will embrace it\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>To find out what these remixes may signal and how they fit into a broader story, Ducker instant messaged with James Friedman, owner of the disco and house-leaning label \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"http://www.throneofbloodmusic.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cem>Throne of Blood Recordings\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>, a DJ and a former journalist.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://soundcloud.com/giorgiomoroder/coldplay-midnight-giorgio-moroder-remix\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Take me back to your headspace before you heard any of these remixes. If someone told you in the beginning of this year that Moroder would remix Haim and Coldplay, and that Cerrone would remix Haim, how excited would you be? How skeptical would you be?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This probably says a lot more about me than about either Moroder or Cerrone, but that news elicits much more skepticism than excitement. I have great respect and admiration for both Moroder and Cerrone, but I’m pretty leery of the musical comeback as a whole, and particularly wary of my heroes cashing in on renewed notoriety. There’s of course the other wrinkle, which is that I’m not especially excited by either Haim or Coldplay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://soundcloud.com/haimtime/haim-forever-giorgio-moroder\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Do you think these remixes are byproducts of Moroder and Cerrone wanting to get back into making new music or are there a couple folks out there working at major labels who have a surprisingly large remix budget who compiled a dream list and got a few surprising “yes” answers to their inquiries?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If I were a betting man, I’d say its probably somewhere in between. The zeitgeist seems to be with Moroder and Cerrone lately, making it an opportune moment [for them] to reemerge from relative obscurity as the godfathers of the disco sound that birthed house, techno, EDM and, of course, Daft Punk. Those same trade winds are also pushing labels to follow suit, to say “what the hell?” and reach out to dudes like them. The fact that Moroder got \u003ca href=\"http://www.rbmaradio.com/shows/giorgio-moroder-live-at-deep-space\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">involved with Red Bull Music Academy\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"http://www.redbull.com/us/en/music/stories/1331642734762/giorgio-moroder-shuts-down-red-bull-guest-house\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">DJed at WMC\u003c/a> and started \u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/giorgiomoroder\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">putting new tracks up on SoundCloud\u003c/a> in the last year or so suggests that he’s not been coerced into dusting off his synths. This is a rare second bite at the apple for two guys that look like they’d be more at home at an AARP convention than \u003ca href=\"http://electricdaisycarnival.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Electric Daisy Carnival\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Right, Moroder is obviously having (and enjoying) a moment. Cerrone’s re-emergence was more surprising to me.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To me, too. Cerrone is no less legendary, but I don’t think his celebrity ever reached the heights of Moroder’s (at least here in the U.S.). That said, his discography is thicker with jams, to my ears. That makes it all the more disappointing that his Haim remix sounds like pretty by-the-numbers funky house that could be of today’s moment or from the late 1990s. Without seeing the credits, it’s kind of hard to tell. That said, disco fans rarely get going about Moroder without talking about Cerrone. “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhKqs7dUMa8\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">I Feel Love\u003c/a>” was \u003cem>the\u003c/em> synthesizer disco track, but “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgGK4qBTwpw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Supernature\u003c/a>” is arguably a superior cut.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://soundcloud.com/haimtime/if-i-could-change-your-mind\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Let’s talk about eurodisco re-creeping into mainstream culture. Though re-interpreting that eurodisco sound, its American counterpart and the subsequent house movement has been part of dance music for more than a decade now, some people were recently predicting that it would take over EDM or dubstep as the next huge thing (\u003c/strong>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1JJd3DZLVE\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cstrong>as best illustrated in one of those great Hitler in the bunker videos\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003cstrong>). That hasn’t happened yet and I don’t think that it will happen because it’s not aggressive enough for young listeners in the US who just want to get turnt, but maybe these remixes are a different way disco will find its way back into the mainstream.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I tend to agree with you. Disco has indeed been creeping for well over a decade. First there was the disco punk stuff championed by the Rapture and \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15129120/lcd-soundsystem\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">LCD Soundsystem\u003c/a>, which was followed pretty quickly by poppier acts with a disco beat, from success stories like \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15403852/the-killers\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The Killers\u003c/a> to also-rans like Louis XIV. In parallel, there was \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/89290268/kylie-minogue\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Kylie\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15402600/madonna\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Madonna\u003c/a> bringing disco into pop. All the while the more classically minded dance music enthusiasts — be it \u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/metroarea\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Metro Area\u003c/a> in NYC or folks like Todd Terje and \u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/prinsthomas\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Prins Thomas\u003c/a> in Europe — started championing the gayer, less-white flavors of disco. For a while in the mid-’00s you couldn’t look at dance music press without hearing about nu-disco. As a trend, that ended up paving the way for a full-blown house music revival and for Daft Punk to make a pretty unabashed disco album. Now dance music is part of mainstream popular culture and there is enormous interest in the more disco and house end of the spectrum. As big as trap and dubstep are, they have not crossed over to the charts much (\u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/blogs/therecord/2014/03/25/293856161/a-rational-conversation-lil-jons-history-of-turning-up\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">DJ Snake\u003c/a> aside). Daft Punk, by contrast, won four Grammys.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As far as predicting how far the crossover can go, I think L.A. is a paradigmatic example of one way things could unfold. After Daft Punk’s big Coachella show in 2006 — and the subsequent emergence of “blog house” and acts like \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/16440168/justice\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Justice\u003c/a> — L.A., long a backwater for dance music in America, found itself at the center of something new. There were hordes of kids interested in raving and things were going crazy. Seven or eight years later, those kids are in their mid-20s and have dug much deeper into the sound. Sure there are oodles of young people eager for EDC or \u003ca href=\"http://www.hardfest.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">HARD Fest\u003c/a>, but there’s also incredible club nights like [A Club Called] Rhonda happening monthly and tens of thousands of kids mobbing \u003ca href=\"http://fyffest.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">FYF\u003c/a> to see really interesting and much less mainstream electronic music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Disco may not be aggressive enough for kids, but adulthood creeps up before many of us lose the desire to get turnt. When it’s less about raging and more about hanging out with friends and dancing with that cutie across the room, disco makes for a much better soundtrack. The bro-ification of EDM may also be hastening the adoption of a gentler disco-ier sound and scene.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Back to these specific remixes. They seem kind of boring to me. Is that just because the sounds Moroder and Cerrone are famous for have been incorporated and mined for a decades? Is it the source material (I like Haim by the way, but maybe they’re just not great to remix)? Or are the remixes just not that good?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m throwing my vote in for “just not that good.” The Coldplay track is pretty interesting for being without snares and highly electronic. Haim are tremendously talented, if not to my tastes. But the remixes just don’t do it for me. Moroder’s both feature pretty standard issue Moroder moves, plus heavy overuse of vocoders. It’s like he took a bunch of notes from \u003cem>Random Access Memories\u003c/em> and deployed them with next to no artistry. As I said before, Cerrone’s track just feels generically pumping, though the vocals do sound great.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Are they getting any play with DJs?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s a fair question that I’m going to have trouble answering. I don’t frequent the sorts of clubs and parties where these remixes would ever make the playlist. There is a service called \u003ca href=\"http://www.directmusicservice.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">DMS [Direct Music Service]\u003c/a> that most of the commercial club/EDM sorts of DJs use that seems like a probably good way these remixes could get picked up by pop-oriented DJs. But I’m not a user of DMS, so I don’t know for sure. What I can say is that all three of these remixes have more plays on SoundCloud than anything that gets me excited musically — by a factor of 10 if not 100. Ultimately, these songs sound more like the kind I’d come across while sweating on a treadmill than shaking a tail feather at the clurrrb.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Yeah, I can’t tell if they actually get play at mainstream clubs or if they’re just for home computer listening and a way to keep Coldplay and Haim’s names in the online music press.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pitchfork wrote about all three, so its a safe bet that the labels knew that a certain degree of interest could be generated by linking big contemporary acts with legendary disco producers. This interest is from quarters that generally don’t devote much attention to chart-toppers like Coldplay. But I’m sure everybody hoped that these remixes could do a “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFx3WX4DES0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Can’t Get You Out Of My Head\u003c/a>” by Kylie Minogue and just take over the pop charts and dance clubs at the same time. That song, which is 12 years old, is a much more interesting articulation of modern electronic disco than any of Moroder and Cerrone’s recent remixes. Same goes for “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDwb9jOVRtU\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Hung Up\u003c/a>” by Madonna. And both were the kinds of things that cool kids could unironically love\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sidenote about Coldplay: I also thought that the Moroder remix was part of a ploy to get them press in the indiesphere, but in researching this idea, I saw that \u003c/strong>\u003ca href=\"http://pitchfork.com/search/more/?query=coldplay&filter=album_reviews\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cstrong>every full-length of theirs has been reviewed by Pitchfork\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003cstrong> and that site’s been \u003c/strong>\u003ca href=\"http://pitchfork.com/search/more/?query=coldplay&filter=news\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cstrong>covering all the news from this album’s release cycle\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003cstrong>. I’m not sure if that says more about the changing state of their site or the state of online music press.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fair enough. Somebody at their label has been commissioning remixes for them for years. There is a pretty good remix by DFA artists \u003ca href=\"http://www.stillgoingrecords.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Still Going\u003c/a> that never got released that I heard five or six years ago. As for Pitchfork’s editorial policies, that’s probably a subject for another column.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>What do you think was the purpose of these remixes from the labels’ perspective? I am sure they weren’t cheap.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I think its a few things: testing the market to see whether a bigger investment in Moroder and Cerrone comeback projects is merited, pushing rock acts like Coldplay and Haim to pop/dance audiences, generating earned and owned media as well as social media action for Coldplay and Haim, and they probably also reflect the lingering influence and power of Moroder and Cerrone to pull some high-visibility favors in hopes of revitalizing their careers with a new generation who doesn’t remember just how uncool disco was for most of the ’80s and ’90s. There is genuine interest in this music and these artists. The number of plays and followers on SoundCloud is impressive. Daft Punk are pop stars now, nearly 20 years after “Musique” came out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>http://youtu.be/tDBgbFk2d-A\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Just how expensive do you think those remixes were?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s really hard to say. The market for remixes has not kept pace with interest, from what I’ve observed. You hear these stories about guys like \u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/marckinchen\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Marc Kinchen\u003c/a> \u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/marckinchen\">(MK)\u003c/a> doing three or four pop and R&B remixes a week for $15,000 a pop in the mid-’90s. It was bananas back then. Nowadays, with sales as flat as they are and revenue from YouTube and streaming sites like Spotify and Beats being as modest as they are, I don’t think there is a revenue stream robust enough to sustain even a fraction of that sort of fee. That said, I’m sure Cerrone and Moroder got much more than somebody newer to success, like \u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/djsnake-king\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">DJ Snake\u003c/a>, can get.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Underground remixes range from free to a couple thousand dollars at the upper reaches. The kinds of artists who are grinding to make a living are mostly doing so by performing \u003cem>a lot\u003c/em>. DJ fees can be enormous, especially if you have lots of social media followers. Based on the numbers around his remixes, Moroder could rake in the cash if he felt up for a busy DJ schedule. That’s a big reason why \u003ca href=\"http://www.billboard.com/biz/articles/news/digital-and-mobile/1549955/sfx-buys-beatport\">SFX bought Beatport\u003c/a> alongside all the event production companies they control. Topping the charts on Beatport is directly correlated with the fees you can command. By owning the charts and the events paying those fees, SFX can influence and game that system to their advantage. By absorbing artist management companies, they can really leverage that kind of integration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sidenote #1: \u003c/strong>\u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/haimtime/haim-if-i-could-change-your\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cstrong>MK did a Haim remix, too.\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003cstrong>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He had a number one in the UK last year with his remix of Storm Queen’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9c3EQhtf9-U\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Look Right Through\u003c/a>.” He’s massive and massively talented. In the U.K., of course, dance music doesn’t have to sneak onto the charts disguised as rap music. Folks like \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/187497419/disclosure\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Disclosure\u003c/a>, Jessie Ware, Hot Natured are pop stars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>We’ve been looking at this from a very calculated perspective, but we haven’t talked about the artists’ agency in these specific remixes. Maybe Haim and Coldplay are really into eurodisco.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s totally true. Haim’s story seems to \u003ca href=\"http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/26/arts/music/musings-of-ariel-rechtshaid-grammy-nominee.html?_r=0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">focus on their producer, Ariel Reichshaid,\u003c/a> whose management company is owned by SFX incidentally. But they also worked extensively with James Ford from \u003ca href=\"http://simianmobiledisco.co.uk/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Simian Mobile Disco\u003c/a> on their album. He’s very well known and respected in dance music, and perhaps he helped turn them on to some stuff. Haim are also very LA. Events like \u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/rhondaintl\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">A Club Called Rhonda\u003c/a> have embraced disco to the extreme and transformed it into one of that city’s most exciting cultural phenomena. ACCR were involved with Moroder’s set at WMC, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As for Coldplay, it’s entirely possible they just love eurodisco. I don’t hear much of that in their music, but it’s possible. They also did a song called “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zp7NtW_hKJI\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">A Sky Full of Stars\u003c/a>” with \u003ca href=\"http://avicii.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Avicii\u003c/a>, who Moroder has been championing. Perhaps the “Midnight” remix was the product of an ad hoc conversation between the dance music godfather and his protégé.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The eurodisco sound is not owned exclusively by Moroder, of course. Cool kids are shitting themselves over \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/blogs/therecord/2014/05/09/310097746/todd-terje-supreme-leisure-on-the-dancefloor\">Todd Terje’s \u003cem>It’s Album Time\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, which is the culmination of many years spent by that Norwegian producer mining the cheesier corners of European disco music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>That Todd Terje album has the potential to win over and redirect a lot of converts. It’s an album — like \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/114219233/the-xx\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">the xx\u003c/a>‘s debut and \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/17093791/massive-attack\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Massive Attack\u003c/a>‘s \u003cem>Mezzanine\u003c/em> — where you can imagine it getting played in every cool hotel lobby, boutique and salon in the country. At least in the ones that just don’t have someone’s iPhone or iPod on shuffle\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Personally I find \u003cem>It’s Album Time \u003c/em>to be a bit heavy handed. Todd Terje is a completely brilliant bricoleur and he has an uncanny knack for synthesizer grooves, but the record feels kitschy in a way that the xx or \u003cem>Mezzanine\u003c/em> don’t. I’m certain it will be heavily employed by audio stylists and their ilk, but I’m guessing it won’t approach the ubiquity of \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/16112744/manu-chao\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Manu Chao\u003c/a>‘s \u003cem>Clandestino\u003c/em> or \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15190805/amadou-mariam\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Amadou & Mariam\u003c/a>‘s \u003cem>Dimanche A Bamako \u003c/em>as background music for fashionable establishments. The fact that disco remains a relevant touchstone for cool kids fourteen years after its underground revival suggests that it still has legs. There’s still more four-on-the-floor cool to be pumped out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>There’s something interesting to take note of when acts “go back to the source” for remixes. I don’t think the practice should be discouraged and can make for some cool stuff, but the fact is, you’re never sure which stage in an artist’s career you’re getting. Cerrone and Moroder have deeeeeep catalogs, not all of which are awesome. There’s also the chance that the heritage act might not want to do to your song what you love them for. They may think they’ve progressed on to something new.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s totally true. One example of somebody going deep for a remix recently is \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/128629816/tame-impala\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Tame Impala\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/modularpeople/tame-impala-elephant-todd\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">who got a remix of “Elephant” from Todd Rundgren\u003c/a>. And it’s pretty cool — totally fuzzed out electronic music with a glam rock stomp. But holy shit that could have gone way wrong. Rundgren is one of those dudes with a massive catalog punctuated by some amazing music. But as with Moroder and Cerrone, there is plenty of queso in there to avoid. What I like about that remix for Tame Impala is that Rundgren managed to do something that feels true to the songwriter, to himself and also feels like a step forward. Moroder and Cerrone managed to put their fingerprints all over Coldplay and Haim without saying anything new. If anything, they paraphrased their best bits poorly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But then again, one of the things that made Moroder and Cerrone so badass was that they were using new tools and techniques to make new music that didn’t have obvious antecedents within the pop canon. In contrast, everything dance-y since disco owes a massive debt to them. That they were dug out of obscurity at the height of disco’s revenge to lend that golden touch — even though its hardly new, fresh, exciting, or without precedent — spells disaster to me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>None of this is to say they should just fade quietly into old age. If they are still excited by disco (and not just by a massive, young, scantily clad audience with their parents money to spend), then I’d like to see them push the form forward. By all means, they have chops as musicians. They know how to produce musicians. They know how to orchestrate, to make tape edits, to do things the old, labor-intensive ways. Those are skills are all but lost to new producers. I mean the EDM guys Moroder seems to love working with all crap out their tracks using a laptop and some plug ins they stole from the internet while jetting from festival to festival on charted jets. That doesn’t impress me nearly as much as Cerrone’s album \u003ca href=\"http://www.discogs.com/Kongas-Africanism/release/312263\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cem>Africanism\u003c/em>\u003c/a> (under the name Kongas).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When you go for the nostalgia remix, it’s a roll of the dice. It’s a roll of the dice with any remix commission, but with legends, its’ a lot harder to ask for changes or reject it outright. Dance music is a pretty small world and it’s not cool to shit all over the legends in the scene, even if they deserve to be shit on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For my label, the only legendary character I’ve gotten a remix from is Andrew Weatherall, who is absolutely still mixing it up at the lunatic fringe of the underground. He’s been weird for so long that his sensibility more or less defines an entire scene. It was a safe bet I’d love what he would do. Turns out \u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/danielavery/daniel-avery-movement-andrew\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">he turned in a slow mo dub mix that’s basically unplayable to a dancefloor and it’s still one of the best things I’ve ever put out\u003c/a>. Go figure.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>It will be interesting to see the next stages to this. Are we going to see Disclosure produce the next \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15817733/usher\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Usher\u003c/a> album? Will Moroder produce an entire Haim album?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m as curious as you are. Disclosure are graduating out of being a crossover dance act to legitimate pop/R&B producers. I hope they continue to play with house idioms, as I think they’ve done a tremendous job translating the sound of dance music as filtered through UK pirate radio into something thoroughly modern and exciting. But they’ve also shown a real ear for good hooks and work really well with vocalists. The fact that they are \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0FOPTYJPXw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">working with\u003c/a> people like \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15285185/mary-j-blige\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Mary J. Blige\u003c/a> as well as folks from their world like Jessie Ware suggests that’s the direction they are moving.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As for Moroder, I’d love to see him showcase his considerable skills and talents as a composer and producer rather than make obvious retreads of his most heavily-referenced dance hits. He’s a legend for reasons that go well beyond “I Feel Love” and “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V5AztWseIdU\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Love to Love You Baby\u003c/a>,” and that seems to be getting lost in the frenzy around his return to the limelight. I’d rather him make film scores and produce bands like Haim than try and become a DJ.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>We haven’t talked about is James Murphy producing \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/16334660/arcade-fire\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Arcade Fire\u003c/a>‘s “disco album,” which didn’t go over as well as some might have hoped.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m going to preface this by saying that I really like James as a person and respect his gifts as a musician and producer. But I loathe Arcade Fire. I think the instrumental of “Reflektor” is the only tolerable thing about that entire album and it’s not something I put on my stereo. Ever.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m hoping that the album fell flat because people realized just how irritating Win Butler and Régine Chassangne are. I find her to be an intolerably awful vocalist. And this is going to sound mean spirited, but I think Arcade Fire are super unattractive. Watching them perform is painful. The bad outfits and face paint aren’t helping at all either. They are obviously talented, but \u003cem>Reflektor\u003c/em> felt like a self-indulgent affectation. The band wasn’t true to their own sound and identity, and I think audiences saw through that. James didn’t do a bad job producing, his fingerprints are all over the record, but at the end of the day, it’s the performances and the sheer awkwardness of the band that dooms them for me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The whole billing themselves as “The Reflektors” seems to suggest they were uncomfortable with the whole undertaking as well. They should stick to making indie rock records. “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GT1KNqLPNXM\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Neighborhood #3\u003c/a>” sounded really fresh and original when it came out. I mean, I hated it then and still hate it now, but at least it sounded like them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Going back a bit. You mentioned Daft Punk and their Grammy wins, and I think \u003cem>Random Access Memories\u003c/em> being a classy disco record probably has a great deal to do with why we’re having this conversation in the first place, but a lot of people were let down by that album when it was first released. Daft Punk has a history of people increasing their appreciation for their records over time, but I’m curious what the music industry will remember more, the initial tepid response after millions of dollars in promotional lead-up or the eventual multi-Grammy wins. And how will their recollection affect their faith in disco as a sound worth investing in?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the end people will remember \u003cem>Random Access Memories\u003c/em> as a great pop disco record. Lots of people were a bit disappointed by the album (myself included), but they won a lot more fans than they’ve lost. And if I’m being honest, I didn’t love \u003cem>Human After All\u003c/em> either. That didn’t stop me from loving Daft Punk with the same fervor that I’ve loved them with since high school. And it didn’t stop me from seeing the Alive Tour five times. I’ve revisited \u003cem>RAM\u003c/em> a couple times in the last year and I still don’t love it, but there are moments on there for sure. “Doin’ It Right” is really good. And as an exercise in studio virtuosity, it’s pretty much unmatched in recent times. It just sounds incredible. And for the folks making investments in disco or any other cultural product, it put up big enough numbers to merit a bit of further investment. Tastes will inevitably shift and disco will go back to being beloved by its true devotees and regarded as irredeemably uncool by everybody else, even if we don’t end up with a \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1CP1751wJA\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Disco Sucks bonfire\u003c/a> this time around. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>http://youtu.be/LL-gyhZVvx0\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=A+Rational+Conversation%3A+How+Deep+Is+The+Disco+Revival%3F&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "The sound made famous by legends like Giorgio Moroder is showing up on Grammy-winning pop albums and major-label remixes, but is the renewed attention on disco anything more than nostalgia?",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>“A Rational Conversation” is a column by writer \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/ericducker\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cem>Eric Ducker\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> in which he gets on iChat or Gchat or the phone or whatever with a special guest to examine a music-related subject that’s entered the pop culture consciousness. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Recently eurodisco legends \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/GiorgioMoroderOfficial\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cem>Giorgio Moroder\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> and \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"http://www.discogs.com/artist/16127-Cerrone\">\u003cem>Cerrone\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> uncorked the champagne of their sound and re-emerged for some unexpected dance remixes of major rock acts. Moroder took on \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15052810/coldplay\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Coldplay\u003c/a>‘s “Midnight” and \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/211451999/haim\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Haim\u003c/a>‘s “Forever,” while Cerrone went at Haim’s “If I Could Change Your Mind.” All qualify as their highest profile releases in years, if not decades.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>These remixes also seem like part of a larger re-embrace of sophisticated, immaculate disco sounds. This trend is probably best exemplified by \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15414420/daft-punk\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Daft Punk\u003c/a>‘s 2013 album \u003c/em>Random Access Memories\u003cem>, which also featured\u003c/em> \u003cem>producer and composer Moroder delivering the spoken introduction to the tribute track “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5m4ZkEqQrn0&feature=kp\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Giorgio by Moroder\u003c/a>.” Still, disco is a groovier and subtler form of dance music than the currently raging sounds of trap and dubstep, so it’s unclear how much young listeners will embrace it\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>To find out what these remixes may signal and how they fit into a broader story, Ducker instant messaged with James Friedman, owner of the disco and house-leaning label \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"http://www.throneofbloodmusic.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cem>Throne of Blood Recordings\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>, a DJ and a former journalist.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://soundcloud.com/giorgiomoroder/coldplay-midnight-giorgio-moroder-remix\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Take me back to your headspace before you heard any of these remixes. If someone told you in the beginning of this year that Moroder would remix Haim and Coldplay, and that Cerrone would remix Haim, how excited would you be? How skeptical would you be?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This probably says a lot more about me than about either Moroder or Cerrone, but that news elicits much more skepticism than excitement. I have great respect and admiration for both Moroder and Cerrone, but I’m pretty leery of the musical comeback as a whole, and particularly wary of my heroes cashing in on renewed notoriety. There’s of course the other wrinkle, which is that I’m not especially excited by either Haim or Coldplay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://soundcloud.com/haimtime/haim-forever-giorgio-moroder\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Do you think these remixes are byproducts of Moroder and Cerrone wanting to get back into making new music or are there a couple folks out there working at major labels who have a surprisingly large remix budget who compiled a dream list and got a few surprising “yes” answers to their inquiries?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If I were a betting man, I’d say its probably somewhere in between. The zeitgeist seems to be with Moroder and Cerrone lately, making it an opportune moment [for them] to reemerge from relative obscurity as the godfathers of the disco sound that birthed house, techno, EDM and, of course, Daft Punk. Those same trade winds are also pushing labels to follow suit, to say “what the hell?” and reach out to dudes like them. The fact that Moroder got \u003ca href=\"http://www.rbmaradio.com/shows/giorgio-moroder-live-at-deep-space\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">involved with Red Bull Music Academy\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"http://www.redbull.com/us/en/music/stories/1331642734762/giorgio-moroder-shuts-down-red-bull-guest-house\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">DJed at WMC\u003c/a> and started \u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/giorgiomoroder\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">putting new tracks up on SoundCloud\u003c/a> in the last year or so suggests that he’s not been coerced into dusting off his synths. This is a rare second bite at the apple for two guys that look like they’d be more at home at an AARP convention than \u003ca href=\"http://electricdaisycarnival.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Electric Daisy Carnival\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Right, Moroder is obviously having (and enjoying) a moment. Cerrone’s re-emergence was more surprising to me.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To me, too. Cerrone is no less legendary, but I don’t think his celebrity ever reached the heights of Moroder’s (at least here in the U.S.). That said, his discography is thicker with jams, to my ears. That makes it all the more disappointing that his Haim remix sounds like pretty by-the-numbers funky house that could be of today’s moment or from the late 1990s. Without seeing the credits, it’s kind of hard to tell. That said, disco fans rarely get going about Moroder without talking about Cerrone. “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhKqs7dUMa8\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">I Feel Love\u003c/a>” was \u003cem>the\u003c/em> synthesizer disco track, but “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgGK4qBTwpw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Supernature\u003c/a>” is arguably a superior cut.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://soundcloud.com/haimtime/if-i-could-change-your-mind\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Let’s talk about eurodisco re-creeping into mainstream culture. Though re-interpreting that eurodisco sound, its American counterpart and the subsequent house movement has been part of dance music for more than a decade now, some people were recently predicting that it would take over EDM or dubstep as the next huge thing (\u003c/strong>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1JJd3DZLVE\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cstrong>as best illustrated in one of those great Hitler in the bunker videos\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003cstrong>). That hasn’t happened yet and I don’t think that it will happen because it’s not aggressive enough for young listeners in the US who just want to get turnt, but maybe these remixes are a different way disco will find its way back into the mainstream.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I tend to agree with you. Disco has indeed been creeping for well over a decade. First there was the disco punk stuff championed by the Rapture and \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15129120/lcd-soundsystem\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">LCD Soundsystem\u003c/a>, which was followed pretty quickly by poppier acts with a disco beat, from success stories like \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15403852/the-killers\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The Killers\u003c/a> to also-rans like Louis XIV. In parallel, there was \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/89290268/kylie-minogue\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Kylie\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15402600/madonna\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Madonna\u003c/a> bringing disco into pop. All the while the more classically minded dance music enthusiasts — be it \u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/metroarea\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Metro Area\u003c/a> in NYC or folks like Todd Terje and \u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/prinsthomas\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Prins Thomas\u003c/a> in Europe — started championing the gayer, less-white flavors of disco. For a while in the mid-’00s you couldn’t look at dance music press without hearing about nu-disco. As a trend, that ended up paving the way for a full-blown house music revival and for Daft Punk to make a pretty unabashed disco album. Now dance music is part of mainstream popular culture and there is enormous interest in the more disco and house end of the spectrum. As big as trap and dubstep are, they have not crossed over to the charts much (\u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/blogs/therecord/2014/03/25/293856161/a-rational-conversation-lil-jons-history-of-turning-up\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">DJ Snake\u003c/a> aside). Daft Punk, by contrast, won four Grammys.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As far as predicting how far the crossover can go, I think L.A. is a paradigmatic example of one way things could unfold. After Daft Punk’s big Coachella show in 2006 — and the subsequent emergence of “blog house” and acts like \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/16440168/justice\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Justice\u003c/a> — L.A., long a backwater for dance music in America, found itself at the center of something new. There were hordes of kids interested in raving and things were going crazy. Seven or eight years later, those kids are in their mid-20s and have dug much deeper into the sound. Sure there are oodles of young people eager for EDC or \u003ca href=\"http://www.hardfest.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">HARD Fest\u003c/a>, but there’s also incredible club nights like [A Club Called] Rhonda happening monthly and tens of thousands of kids mobbing \u003ca href=\"http://fyffest.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">FYF\u003c/a> to see really interesting and much less mainstream electronic music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Disco may not be aggressive enough for kids, but adulthood creeps up before many of us lose the desire to get turnt. When it’s less about raging and more about hanging out with friends and dancing with that cutie across the room, disco makes for a much better soundtrack. The bro-ification of EDM may also be hastening the adoption of a gentler disco-ier sound and scene.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Back to these specific remixes. They seem kind of boring to me. Is that just because the sounds Moroder and Cerrone are famous for have been incorporated and mined for a decades? Is it the source material (I like Haim by the way, but maybe they’re just not great to remix)? Or are the remixes just not that good?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m throwing my vote in for “just not that good.” The Coldplay track is pretty interesting for being without snares and highly electronic. Haim are tremendously talented, if not to my tastes. But the remixes just don’t do it for me. Moroder’s both feature pretty standard issue Moroder moves, plus heavy overuse of vocoders. It’s like he took a bunch of notes from \u003cem>Random Access Memories\u003c/em> and deployed them with next to no artistry. As I said before, Cerrone’s track just feels generically pumping, though the vocals do sound great.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Are they getting any play with DJs?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s a fair question that I’m going to have trouble answering. I don’t frequent the sorts of clubs and parties where these remixes would ever make the playlist. There is a service called \u003ca href=\"http://www.directmusicservice.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">DMS [Direct Music Service]\u003c/a> that most of the commercial club/EDM sorts of DJs use that seems like a probably good way these remixes could get picked up by pop-oriented DJs. But I’m not a user of DMS, so I don’t know for sure. What I can say is that all three of these remixes have more plays on SoundCloud than anything that gets me excited musically — by a factor of 10 if not 100. Ultimately, these songs sound more like the kind I’d come across while sweating on a treadmill than shaking a tail feather at the clurrrb.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Yeah, I can’t tell if they actually get play at mainstream clubs or if they’re just for home computer listening and a way to keep Coldplay and Haim’s names in the online music press.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pitchfork wrote about all three, so its a safe bet that the labels knew that a certain degree of interest could be generated by linking big contemporary acts with legendary disco producers. This interest is from quarters that generally don’t devote much attention to chart-toppers like Coldplay. But I’m sure everybody hoped that these remixes could do a “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFx3WX4DES0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Can’t Get You Out Of My Head\u003c/a>” by Kylie Minogue and just take over the pop charts and dance clubs at the same time. That song, which is 12 years old, is a much more interesting articulation of modern electronic disco than any of Moroder and Cerrone’s recent remixes. Same goes for “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDwb9jOVRtU\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Hung Up\u003c/a>” by Madonna. And both were the kinds of things that cool kids could unironically love\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sidenote about Coldplay: I also thought that the Moroder remix was part of a ploy to get them press in the indiesphere, but in researching this idea, I saw that \u003c/strong>\u003ca href=\"http://pitchfork.com/search/more/?query=coldplay&filter=album_reviews\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cstrong>every full-length of theirs has been reviewed by Pitchfork\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003cstrong> and that site’s been \u003c/strong>\u003ca href=\"http://pitchfork.com/search/more/?query=coldplay&filter=news\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cstrong>covering all the news from this album’s release cycle\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003cstrong>. I’m not sure if that says more about the changing state of their site or the state of online music press.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fair enough. Somebody at their label has been commissioning remixes for them for years. There is a pretty good remix by DFA artists \u003ca href=\"http://www.stillgoingrecords.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Still Going\u003c/a> that never got released that I heard five or six years ago. As for Pitchfork’s editorial policies, that’s probably a subject for another column.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>What do you think was the purpose of these remixes from the labels’ perspective? I am sure they weren’t cheap.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I think its a few things: testing the market to see whether a bigger investment in Moroder and Cerrone comeback projects is merited, pushing rock acts like Coldplay and Haim to pop/dance audiences, generating earned and owned media as well as social media action for Coldplay and Haim, and they probably also reflect the lingering influence and power of Moroder and Cerrone to pull some high-visibility favors in hopes of revitalizing their careers with a new generation who doesn’t remember just how uncool disco was for most of the ’80s and ’90s. There is genuine interest in this music and these artists. The number of plays and followers on SoundCloud is impressive. Daft Punk are pop stars now, nearly 20 years after “Musique” came out.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/tDBgbFk2d-A'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/tDBgbFk2d-A'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Just how expensive do you think those remixes were?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s really hard to say. The market for remixes has not kept pace with interest, from what I’ve observed. You hear these stories about guys like \u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/marckinchen\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Marc Kinchen\u003c/a> \u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/marckinchen\">(MK)\u003c/a> doing three or four pop and R&B remixes a week for $15,000 a pop in the mid-’90s. It was bananas back then. Nowadays, with sales as flat as they are and revenue from YouTube and streaming sites like Spotify and Beats being as modest as they are, I don’t think there is a revenue stream robust enough to sustain even a fraction of that sort of fee. That said, I’m sure Cerrone and Moroder got much more than somebody newer to success, like \u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/djsnake-king\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">DJ Snake\u003c/a>, can get.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Underground remixes range from free to a couple thousand dollars at the upper reaches. The kinds of artists who are grinding to make a living are mostly doing so by performing \u003cem>a lot\u003c/em>. DJ fees can be enormous, especially if you have lots of social media followers. Based on the numbers around his remixes, Moroder could rake in the cash if he felt up for a busy DJ schedule. That’s a big reason why \u003ca href=\"http://www.billboard.com/biz/articles/news/digital-and-mobile/1549955/sfx-buys-beatport\">SFX bought Beatport\u003c/a> alongside all the event production companies they control. Topping the charts on Beatport is directly correlated with the fees you can command. By owning the charts and the events paying those fees, SFX can influence and game that system to their advantage. By absorbing artist management companies, they can really leverage that kind of integration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sidenote #1: \u003c/strong>\u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/haimtime/haim-if-i-could-change-your\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cstrong>MK did a Haim remix, too.\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003cstrong>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He had a number one in the UK last year with his remix of Storm Queen’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9c3EQhtf9-U\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Look Right Through\u003c/a>.” He’s massive and massively talented. In the U.K., of course, dance music doesn’t have to sneak onto the charts disguised as rap music. Folks like \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/187497419/disclosure\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Disclosure\u003c/a>, Jessie Ware, Hot Natured are pop stars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>We’ve been looking at this from a very calculated perspective, but we haven’t talked about the artists’ agency in these specific remixes. Maybe Haim and Coldplay are really into eurodisco.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s totally true. Haim’s story seems to \u003ca href=\"http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/26/arts/music/musings-of-ariel-rechtshaid-grammy-nominee.html?_r=0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">focus on their producer, Ariel Reichshaid,\u003c/a> whose management company is owned by SFX incidentally. But they also worked extensively with James Ford from \u003ca href=\"http://simianmobiledisco.co.uk/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Simian Mobile Disco\u003c/a> on their album. He’s very well known and respected in dance music, and perhaps he helped turn them on to some stuff. Haim are also very LA. Events like \u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/rhondaintl\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">A Club Called Rhonda\u003c/a> have embraced disco to the extreme and transformed it into one of that city’s most exciting cultural phenomena. ACCR were involved with Moroder’s set at WMC, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As for Coldplay, it’s entirely possible they just love eurodisco. I don’t hear much of that in their music, but it’s possible. They also did a song called “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zp7NtW_hKJI\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">A Sky Full of Stars\u003c/a>” with \u003ca href=\"http://avicii.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Avicii\u003c/a>, who Moroder has been championing. Perhaps the “Midnight” remix was the product of an ad hoc conversation between the dance music godfather and his protégé.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The eurodisco sound is not owned exclusively by Moroder, of course. Cool kids are shitting themselves over \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/blogs/therecord/2014/05/09/310097746/todd-terje-supreme-leisure-on-the-dancefloor\">Todd Terje’s \u003cem>It’s Album Time\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, which is the culmination of many years spent by that Norwegian producer mining the cheesier corners of European disco music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>That Todd Terje album has the potential to win over and redirect a lot of converts. It’s an album — like \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/114219233/the-xx\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">the xx\u003c/a>‘s debut and \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/17093791/massive-attack\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Massive Attack\u003c/a>‘s \u003cem>Mezzanine\u003c/em> — where you can imagine it getting played in every cool hotel lobby, boutique and salon in the country. At least in the ones that just don’t have someone’s iPhone or iPod on shuffle\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Personally I find \u003cem>It’s Album Time \u003c/em>to be a bit heavy handed. Todd Terje is a completely brilliant bricoleur and he has an uncanny knack for synthesizer grooves, but the record feels kitschy in a way that the xx or \u003cem>Mezzanine\u003c/em> don’t. I’m certain it will be heavily employed by audio stylists and their ilk, but I’m guessing it won’t approach the ubiquity of \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/16112744/manu-chao\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Manu Chao\u003c/a>‘s \u003cem>Clandestino\u003c/em> or \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15190805/amadou-mariam\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Amadou & Mariam\u003c/a>‘s \u003cem>Dimanche A Bamako \u003c/em>as background music for fashionable establishments. The fact that disco remains a relevant touchstone for cool kids fourteen years after its underground revival suggests that it still has legs. There’s still more four-on-the-floor cool to be pumped out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>There’s something interesting to take note of when acts “go back to the source” for remixes. I don’t think the practice should be discouraged and can make for some cool stuff, but the fact is, you’re never sure which stage in an artist’s career you’re getting. Cerrone and Moroder have deeeeeep catalogs, not all of which are awesome. There’s also the chance that the heritage act might not want to do to your song what you love them for. They may think they’ve progressed on to something new.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s totally true. One example of somebody going deep for a remix recently is \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/128629816/tame-impala\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Tame Impala\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/modularpeople/tame-impala-elephant-todd\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">who got a remix of “Elephant” from Todd Rundgren\u003c/a>. And it’s pretty cool — totally fuzzed out electronic music with a glam rock stomp. But holy shit that could have gone way wrong. Rundgren is one of those dudes with a massive catalog punctuated by some amazing music. But as with Moroder and Cerrone, there is plenty of queso in there to avoid. What I like about that remix for Tame Impala is that Rundgren managed to do something that feels true to the songwriter, to himself and also feels like a step forward. Moroder and Cerrone managed to put their fingerprints all over Coldplay and Haim without saying anything new. If anything, they paraphrased their best bits poorly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But then again, one of the things that made Moroder and Cerrone so badass was that they were using new tools and techniques to make new music that didn’t have obvious antecedents within the pop canon. In contrast, everything dance-y since disco owes a massive debt to them. That they were dug out of obscurity at the height of disco’s revenge to lend that golden touch — even though its hardly new, fresh, exciting, or without precedent — spells disaster to me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>None of this is to say they should just fade quietly into old age. If they are still excited by disco (and not just by a massive, young, scantily clad audience with their parents money to spend), then I’d like to see them push the form forward. By all means, they have chops as musicians. They know how to produce musicians. They know how to orchestrate, to make tape edits, to do things the old, labor-intensive ways. Those are skills are all but lost to new producers. I mean the EDM guys Moroder seems to love working with all crap out their tracks using a laptop and some plug ins they stole from the internet while jetting from festival to festival on charted jets. That doesn’t impress me nearly as much as Cerrone’s album \u003ca href=\"http://www.discogs.com/Kongas-Africanism/release/312263\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cem>Africanism\u003c/em>\u003c/a> (under the name Kongas).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When you go for the nostalgia remix, it’s a roll of the dice. It’s a roll of the dice with any remix commission, but with legends, its’ a lot harder to ask for changes or reject it outright. Dance music is a pretty small world and it’s not cool to shit all over the legends in the scene, even if they deserve to be shit on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For my label, the only legendary character I’ve gotten a remix from is Andrew Weatherall, who is absolutely still mixing it up at the lunatic fringe of the underground. He’s been weird for so long that his sensibility more or less defines an entire scene. It was a safe bet I’d love what he would do. Turns out \u003ca href=\"https://soundcloud.com/danielavery/daniel-avery-movement-andrew\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">he turned in a slow mo dub mix that’s basically unplayable to a dancefloor and it’s still one of the best things I’ve ever put out\u003c/a>. Go figure.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>It will be interesting to see the next stages to this. Are we going to see Disclosure produce the next \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15817733/usher\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Usher\u003c/a> album? Will Moroder produce an entire Haim album?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m as curious as you are. Disclosure are graduating out of being a crossover dance act to legitimate pop/R&B producers. I hope they continue to play with house idioms, as I think they’ve done a tremendous job translating the sound of dance music as filtered through UK pirate radio into something thoroughly modern and exciting. But they’ve also shown a real ear for good hooks and work really well with vocalists. The fact that they are \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0FOPTYJPXw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">working with\u003c/a> people like \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15285185/mary-j-blige\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Mary J. Blige\u003c/a> as well as folks from their world like Jessie Ware suggests that’s the direction they are moving.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As for Moroder, I’d love to see him showcase his considerable skills and talents as a composer and producer rather than make obvious retreads of his most heavily-referenced dance hits. He’s a legend for reasons that go well beyond “I Feel Love” and “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V5AztWseIdU\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Love to Love You Baby\u003c/a>,” and that seems to be getting lost in the frenzy around his return to the limelight. I’d rather him make film scores and produce bands like Haim than try and become a DJ.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>We haven’t talked about is James Murphy producing \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/16334660/arcade-fire\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Arcade Fire\u003c/a>‘s “disco album,” which didn’t go over as well as some might have hoped.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m going to preface this by saying that I really like James as a person and respect his gifts as a musician and producer. But I loathe Arcade Fire. I think the instrumental of “Reflektor” is the only tolerable thing about that entire album and it’s not something I put on my stereo. Ever.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m hoping that the album fell flat because people realized just how irritating Win Butler and Régine Chassangne are. I find her to be an intolerably awful vocalist. And this is going to sound mean spirited, but I think Arcade Fire are super unattractive. Watching them perform is painful. The bad outfits and face paint aren’t helping at all either. They are obviously talented, but \u003cem>Reflektor\u003c/em> felt like a self-indulgent affectation. The band wasn’t true to their own sound and identity, and I think audiences saw through that. James didn’t do a bad job producing, his fingerprints are all over the record, but at the end of the day, it’s the performances and the sheer awkwardness of the band that dooms them for me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The whole billing themselves as “The Reflektors” seems to suggest they were uncomfortable with the whole undertaking as well. They should stick to making indie rock records. “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GT1KNqLPNXM\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Neighborhood #3\u003c/a>” sounded really fresh and original when it came out. I mean, I hated it then and still hate it now, but at least it sounded like them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Going back a bit. You mentioned Daft Punk and their Grammy wins, and I think \u003cem>Random Access Memories\u003c/em> being a classy disco record probably has a great deal to do with why we’re having this conversation in the first place, but a lot of people were let down by that album when it was first released. Daft Punk has a history of people increasing their appreciation for their records over time, but I’m curious what the music industry will remember more, the initial tepid response after millions of dollars in promotional lead-up or the eventual multi-Grammy wins. And how will their recollection affect their faith in disco as a sound worth investing in?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the end people will remember \u003cem>Random Access Memories\u003c/em> as a great pop disco record. Lots of people were a bit disappointed by the album (myself included), but they won a lot more fans than they’ve lost. And if I’m being honest, I didn’t love \u003cem>Human After All\u003c/em> either. That didn’t stop me from loving Daft Punk with the same fervor that I’ve loved them with since high school. And it didn’t stop me from seeing the Alive Tour five times. I’ve revisited \u003cem>RAM\u003c/em> a couple times in the last year and I still don’t love it, but there are moments on there for sure. “Doin’ It Right” is really good. And as an exercise in studio virtuosity, it’s pretty much unmatched in recent times. It just sounds incredible. And for the folks making investments in disco or any other cultural product, it put up big enough numbers to merit a bit of further investment. Tastes will inevitably shift and disco will go back to being beloved by its true devotees and regarded as irredeemably uncool by everybody else, even if we don’t end up with a \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1CP1751wJA\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Disco Sucks bonfire\u003c/a> this time around. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>Swedish director Malik Bendjelloul, who won an Oscar last year for his 2012 documentary \u003cem>Searching for Sugar Man\u003c/em>, has been found dead in Stockholm at age 36, police and family members confirm.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Reuters reports:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\n\u003cp>“Stockholm police declined to provide any further details about Bendjelloul’s death.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“‘What I can say is that there are no suspicions any crime was involved,’ Stockholm police duty officer Pia Glenvik said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Bendjelloul won an Oscar in 2013 as a first-time filmmaker for \u003cem>Searching for Sugar Man\u003c/em>. The film followed two South African journalists who set out to find what had become of Sixto Rodriguez, an American singer who was popular in South Africa who seemingly vanished without a trace.”\u003c/p>\n\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://variety.com/2014/film/news/oscar-winning-director-of-searching-for-sugar-man-found-dead-1201179913/\">Variety says:\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\n\u003cp>“Born in Sweden, Bendjelloul appeared on TV as a child and then studied journalism and media production. He produced music documentaries for Swedish television and worked as a TV reporter before leaving to travel in Africa and South America.”\u003c/p>\n\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Oscar-Winning+Director+Malik+Bendjelloul+Dies+At+36&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Swedish director Malik Bendjelloul, who won an Oscar last year for his 2012 documentary \u003cem>Searching for Sugar Man\u003c/em>, has been found dead in Stockholm at age 36, police and family members confirm.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Reuters reports:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\n\u003cp>“Stockholm police declined to provide any further details about Bendjelloul’s death.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“‘What I can say is that there are no suspicions any crime was involved,’ Stockholm police duty officer Pia Glenvik said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Bendjelloul won an Oscar in 2013 as a first-time filmmaker for \u003cem>Searching for Sugar Man\u003c/em>. The film followed two South African journalists who set out to find what had become of Sixto Rodriguez, an American singer who was popular in South Africa who seemingly vanished without a trace.”\u003c/p>\n\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://variety.com/2014/film/news/oscar-winning-director-of-searching-for-sugar-man-found-dead-1201179913/\">Variety says:\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\n\u003cp>“Born in Sweden, Bendjelloul appeared on TV as a child and then studied journalism and media production. He produced music documentaries for Swedish television and worked as a TV reporter before leaving to travel in Africa and South America.”\u003c/p>\n\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Oscar-Winning+Director+Malik+Bendjelloul+Dies+At+36&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>H.R. Giger was the guy who made me sleep with the lights on for years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The iconic Swiss painter and sculptor, who died yesterday at the age of 74, reportedly suffered from night terrors for much of his life, so perhaps his inimitable art was his revenge upon the world. He is usually called a “surrealist,” but millions of people who couldn’t name another one of those knew him as the guy who created the titular beast for Ridley Scott’s classic 1979 horror film \u003cem>Alien\u003c/em> — a dripping, phallic insect with a long, serrated tail and a spring-loaded second jaw that shoots out of its glistening mouth. A thing with teeth inside of a thing with teeth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You wouldn’t expect this particular creation to become a consensus candidate, but it did. Decades after \u003cem>Alien\u003c/em> hit theatres (the picture will turn 35 Memorial Day weekend), the creature’s status as the cinema’s most nightmarish beast is untouched. Even subsequent movie monsters designed by Giger, who became a hot commodity after \u003cem>Alien\u003c/em>, can’t come close.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Giger was in his late thirties when Scott hired him to create not just a monster (based on the one seen in Giger’s painting “Necronomicon IV”), but to design much of the film surrounding it. Giger created the first half of his creature’s two-stage life-cycle — the crab-like “facehugger” that affixes itself to its victim’s face and then implants a fast-maturing embryo inside the host’s abdomen that will later explode from the chest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10135952\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/Chestburster-crop.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/Chestburster-crop.jpg\" alt=\"The "chestburster" is one of the many deeply unsettling images of 1979's Alien, probably the best-known work of designer H.R. Giger. Giger's original chestburster design changed substantially as he inched toward this final version with director Ridley Scott and others.\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" class=\"size-full wp-image-10135952\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/Chestburster-crop.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/Chestburster-crop-400x225.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/Chestburster-crop-300x168.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The “chestburster” is one of the many deeply unsettling images of 1979’s Alien, probably the best-known work of designer H.R. Giger. Giger’s original chestburster design changed substantially as he inched toward this final version with director Ridley Scott and others. \u003ccite>(20th Century Fox/PictureDesk)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>He also designed the horseshoe-shapted alien craft where the unlucky crew of the Earth-based freighter Nostromo encounters a patch of sweaty, translucent eggs. Those were his designs, too. Like many of the creatures in Giger’s paintings, these elements all seemed to posit a technology wherein rib cages and sex organs of both genders were the primary building materials. (\u003cem>Alien\u003c/em> won an Oscar for its visual effects; it was nominated for art direction but lost to \u003cem>All That Jazz\u003c/em>.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Scott’s disappointing 2012 film \u003cem>Prometheus\u003c/em> was an attempt to answer \u003cem>Alien\u003c/em> fans’ decades-old questions about the race of creatures to whom this ship belonged. As is so often the case, \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/blogs/monkeysee/2012/06/08/154572020/hello-again-my-gooey-friends-on-loving-alien-and-seeing-prometheus\">the solution felt matter-of-fact where the mystery had felt vast and unknowable\u003c/a>. Almost inevitably, \u003ca href=\"http://chrisklimek.com/2012/10/18/making-of-documentary-the-furious-gods-reveals-the-people-who-actually-made-prometheus-had-no-idea-wtf-either/\">the film was a letdown\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The cliche about the makers of violent, horrific or sexually extreme creative work is that they’re sweetest, most approachable people you could ever meet. Giger was emphatically not that. The reason his interview segments on the \u003cem>Alien\u003c/em> Anthology DVD/Blu Ray box sets remain a touchstone in geek circles is that Giger comes off as an even more frightening weirdo savant than his work would indicate. Pasty and pale and prematurely gray, dressed all in black, his Swiss-accented English dropping inflections in all the wrong places, and seated, naturally, in a high-backed chair that looks like it was assembled from the spinal columns of gorillas, he delivers the goods.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He pronounces dinosaur like “dine-oh-sour.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He says stuff like this: “The light, it hurts me. If you have too much sun, then you will be in the shadow. And I like always to be in the shadow, in the dark.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s a rough transcription. He has a tendency to let his sentences trail off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Naturally, he fondles a pussycat, like the one whose hiss and slow retreat signals the mature, full-size alien’s entrance — a majestic, slow descent into frame from the ceiling, about 60 percent of the way through the movie.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Matt Gourley, one of the creators of the brilliant comedy podcast Superego, has a recurring bit where he uses his uncanny Giger impression to put this kinky vampire in mundane domestic situations, like when his son needs him to sign a school permission slip and Giger won’t stop saying things like, “I made an acoustic sex fetus!” My favorite one is where he reads \u003cem>The Night Before Christmas\u003c/em> as Giger. “Let’s skip ahead to where they die,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Alien\u003c/em> largely follows the \u003cem>Jaws\u003c/em> rule, withholding a full, clear view of the creature until late in the film. But the fright-embryo is implanted in your belly long before that, churning in your intestines, long before we see it, because of the terrifying visit to that Giger-designed \u003cem>Alien\u003c/em> ship in the first act of the picture. \u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Thanks+To+H.R.+Giger%2C+For+All+The+Sleepless+Nights&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>H.R. Giger was the guy who made me sleep with the lights on for years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The iconic Swiss painter and sculptor, who died yesterday at the age of 74, reportedly suffered from night terrors for much of his life, so perhaps his inimitable art was his revenge upon the world. He is usually called a “surrealist,” but millions of people who couldn’t name another one of those knew him as the guy who created the titular beast for Ridley Scott’s classic 1979 horror film \u003cem>Alien\u003c/em> — a dripping, phallic insect with a long, serrated tail and a spring-loaded second jaw that shoots out of its glistening mouth. A thing with teeth inside of a thing with teeth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You wouldn’t expect this particular creation to become a consensus candidate, but it did. Decades after \u003cem>Alien\u003c/em> hit theatres (the picture will turn 35 Memorial Day weekend), the creature’s status as the cinema’s most nightmarish beast is untouched. Even subsequent movie monsters designed by Giger, who became a hot commodity after \u003cem>Alien\u003c/em>, can’t come close.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Giger was in his late thirties when Scott hired him to create not just a monster (based on the one seen in Giger’s painting “Necronomicon IV”), but to design much of the film surrounding it. Giger created the first half of his creature’s two-stage life-cycle — the crab-like “facehugger” that affixes itself to its victim’s face and then implants a fast-maturing embryo inside the host’s abdomen that will later explode from the chest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_10135952\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/Chestburster-crop.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/Chestburster-crop.jpg\" alt=\"The "chestburster" is one of the many deeply unsettling images of 1979's Alien, probably the best-known work of designer H.R. Giger. Giger's original chestburster design changed substantially as he inched toward this final version with director Ridley Scott and others.\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" class=\"size-full wp-image-10135952\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/Chestburster-crop.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/Chestburster-crop-400x225.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/05/Chestburster-crop-300x168.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The “chestburster” is one of the many deeply unsettling images of 1979’s Alien, probably the best-known work of designer H.R. Giger. Giger’s original chestburster design changed substantially as he inched toward this final version with director Ridley Scott and others. \u003ccite>(20th Century Fox/PictureDesk)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>He also designed the horseshoe-shapted alien craft where the unlucky crew of the Earth-based freighter Nostromo encounters a patch of sweaty, translucent eggs. Those were his designs, too. Like many of the creatures in Giger’s paintings, these elements all seemed to posit a technology wherein rib cages and sex organs of both genders were the primary building materials. (\u003cem>Alien\u003c/em> won an Oscar for its visual effects; it was nominated for art direction but lost to \u003cem>All That Jazz\u003c/em>.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Scott’s disappointing 2012 film \u003cem>Prometheus\u003c/em> was an attempt to answer \u003cem>Alien\u003c/em> fans’ decades-old questions about the race of creatures to whom this ship belonged. As is so often the case, \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/blogs/monkeysee/2012/06/08/154572020/hello-again-my-gooey-friends-on-loving-alien-and-seeing-prometheus\">the solution felt matter-of-fact where the mystery had felt vast and unknowable\u003c/a>. Almost inevitably, \u003ca href=\"http://chrisklimek.com/2012/10/18/making-of-documentary-the-furious-gods-reveals-the-people-who-actually-made-prometheus-had-no-idea-wtf-either/\">the film was a letdown\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The cliche about the makers of violent, horrific or sexually extreme creative work is that they’re sweetest, most approachable people you could ever meet. Giger was emphatically not that. The reason his interview segments on the \u003cem>Alien\u003c/em> Anthology DVD/Blu Ray box sets remain a touchstone in geek circles is that Giger comes off as an even more frightening weirdo savant than his work would indicate. Pasty and pale and prematurely gray, dressed all in black, his Swiss-accented English dropping inflections in all the wrong places, and seated, naturally, in a high-backed chair that looks like it was assembled from the spinal columns of gorillas, he delivers the goods.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He pronounces dinosaur like “dine-oh-sour.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He says stuff like this: “The light, it hurts me. If you have too much sun, then you will be in the shadow. And I like always to be in the shadow, in the dark.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s a rough transcription. He has a tendency to let his sentences trail off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Naturally, he fondles a pussycat, like the one whose hiss and slow retreat signals the mature, full-size alien’s entrance — a majestic, slow descent into frame from the ceiling, about 60 percent of the way through the movie.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Matt Gourley, one of the creators of the brilliant comedy podcast Superego, has a recurring bit where he uses his uncanny Giger impression to put this kinky vampire in mundane domestic situations, like when his son needs him to sign a school permission slip and Giger won’t stop saying things like, “I made an acoustic sex fetus!” My favorite one is where he reads \u003cem>The Night Before Christmas\u003c/em> as Giger. “Let’s skip ahead to where they die,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Alien\u003c/em> largely follows the \u003cem>Jaws\u003c/em> rule, withholding a full, clear view of the creature until late in the film. But the fright-embryo is implanted in your belly long before that, churning in your intestines, long before we see it, because of the terrifying visit to that Giger-designed \u003cem>Alien\u003c/em> ship in the first act of the picture. \u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Thanks+To+H.R.+Giger%2C+For+All+The+Sleepless+Nights&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Recall That Ice Cream Truck Song? We Have Unpleasant News For You",
"headTitle": "Recall That Ice Cream Truck Song? We Have Unpleasant News For You | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>EDITOR'S NOTE: This article is about a virulently, racist song. Read no further if you wish to avoid racist imagery and slurs.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"[N****] Love A Watermelon Ha! Ha! Ha!\" merits the distinction of the most racist song title in America. Released in March, 1916, by Columbia Records it was written by actor Harry C. Browne and played on the familiar depiction of black people as mindless beasts of burden greedily devouring slices of watermelon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I came across this gem while researching racial stereotypes. I was a bit conflicted on whether the song warranted a listen. Admittedly though, beneath my righteous indignation, I was rather curious how century-old, overt racism sounded and slightly amused by the farcical title. When I started the song, the music that tumbled from the speakers was that of the ever-recognizable jingle of the \u003ca href=\"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZB6WXDuM1g\">ice cream truck\u003c/a> (For the record, not all ice cream trucks play this same song, but a great many of them do.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As quickly as it began, the music paused, and this call-and-response ensued:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\n\u003cp>Browne: \"You n******s quit throwin' them bones and come down and get your ice cream!\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Black men (incredulously): \"Ice Cream?!?\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Browne: \"Yes, ice cream! Colored man's ice cream: WATERMELON!!\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>My mouth dropped. The music immediately resumed and so did the racism. I soon realized that the ice cream truck song was forever ruined for me, especially once the chorus began:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>N***** love a watermelon ha ha, ha ha!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>N***** love a watermelon ha ha, ha ha!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For here, they're made with a half a pound of co'l\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There's nothing like a watermelon for a hungry coon\u003c/p>\n\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ebh6x6Bze_0\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Origin of the song\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I wondered how such a prejudiced song could have become the anthem of ice cream and childhood summers. I learned that though Mr. Browne was fairly creative in his lyrics, the song's premise and its melody are nearly as old as America itself. As often happens with matters of race, something that is rather \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/blogs/codeswitch/2014/03/23/291525991/when-vanilla-was-brown-and-how-we-came-to-see-it-as-white\">vanilla\u003c/a> in origin is coopted and sprinkled with malice along the way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For his creation, Browne simply used the well-known melody of the early nineteenth-century song \"\u003ca href=\"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VsnZxfkkoKQ\">Turkey in the Straw\u003c/a>,\" which dates back to the even older and traditional British song \"\u003ca href=\"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etQ7knwsglU\">The (Old) Rose Tree\u003c/a>.\" The tune was brought to America's colonies by Scots-Irish immigrants who settled along the Appalachian Trail and added lyrics that mirrored their new lifestyle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The first and natural inclination, of course, is to assume that the ice cream truck song is simply paying homage to \"Turkey in the Straw,\" but the melody reached the nation only after it was appropriated by traveling blackface minstrel shows. There is simply no divorcing the song from the dozens of decades it was almost exclusively used for coming up with new ways to ridicule, and profit from, black people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Blackface minstrels steal the show\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the late 1820s, the music was given new lyrics that dripped with racism and titled \"\u003ca href=\"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0i9XMyTw-o\">Zip Coon\u003c/a>.\" The blackface character of the same name parodied a free black man attempting to conform to white high society by dressing in fine clothes and using big words. Fifty years later in antebellum America, the character became an archetype of the black urbanite and propelled minstrel shows to the height of their popularity. Zip Coon was the city slicker counterpart to the dimwitted, rural blackface character whose name became infamous in 20th century America — Jim Crow. These two characters would often interact on stage and were the inspiration for the hugely successful Amos 'n' Andy act decades later.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The lyrics of \"Zip Coon\" follow the namesake through encounters with possums, playing the banjo, and courting a woman whose skin was so black that he calls her \"ol Suky blue skin.\" A century later, it was still celebrated and inspiring America's music. The recognizable melody aside, we've all sung a variation of the lyrics. The chorus goes:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\n\u003cp>O zip a duden duden duden zip a duden day.\u003c/p>\n\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>(If this sounds similar to the Academy Award winning \"\u003ca href=\"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LcxYwwIL5zQ\">Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah\u003c/a>,\" it's because that song was derived from this chorus)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the turn of the twentieth century, one of the nation's \u003ca href=\"http://www.ferris.edu/htmls/news/jimcrow/index.htm\">most popular collectibles was the coon card\u003c/a> — a postcard with racist artwork, such as bug-eyed, clown-faced blacks eating watermelon. These items were essentially the racist version of trading cards and nearly ubiquitous. Browne meshed the theme of the popular coon cards with the familiar melody and voila: \"N***** Love a Watermelon Ha! Ha! Ha!\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The ice cream cross-over happened concurrently. Nineteenth-century ice cream parlors played the popular minstrel songs of the day. After World War II, the advent of the automobile and the ensuing sprawl required parlors to devise a way to take their products to the customers. The ice cream truck was the solution and a music box was installed in them as a way to announce their presence in neighborhoods. Naturally, the traditional minstrel tunes of the previous century were employed to evoke the memorable parlor experience.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And this is the story of why our beloved ice cream truck plays blackface minstrel music that sends kids dashing into homes in a Pavlovian frenzy searching for money to buy a popsicle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Race, ice cream and America\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here in the nation's capital, the cherry blossoms have come and gone. This means the warm weather will soon bring out the ice cream trucks, and I'll be confronted once again by its inconvenient truth. It's not new knowledge that matters of race permeate the depths of our history and infiltrate the most innocent of experiences, even the simple pleasure of ice cream (Who can forget Eddie Murphy's famous, NSFW routine about \u003ca href=\"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vg-csjbwo5s\">the poor, black experience with ice cream trucks\u003c/a>?). However, when the reach of racism robs me of fond memories from my childhood, it feels intensely personal again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Whenever I hear the music now, the antique voice laughing about n******s and watermelon fills my head. I can live with this, but what's to be done on the summer day when my children's eyes light up at the far-off sound of the familiar melody, and they dash in a frenzy towards me for change? Do I empower them with the history of our country or encourage the youthful exuberance induced by the ice cream truck? Is it my responsibility to foul the sweet taste of ice cream with their first taste of racism?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The answer is intellectually complex, but parental intuition provides clarity. When teeth fall out, I blame the dollar under their pillow on the tooth fairy. When presents appear overnight under the fir tree, I say Santa Claus is the culprit. And so when a song about n******s and watermelon fills the suburban air, I will smile and hand over money from my pocket. The sight of my children enjoying a Good Humor ice cream bar will fight back the racist song that lampooned black people who happened to be in good humor. The delivery of the cold hard truth can wait until another day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Recall+That+Ice+Cream+Truck+Song%3F+We+Have+Unpleasant+News+For+You&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDA1OTI3MjQ5MDEyODUwMTE2MzM1YzNmZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>EDITOR'S NOTE: This article is about a virulently, racist song. Read no further if you wish to avoid racist imagery and slurs.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"[N****] Love A Watermelon Ha! Ha! Ha!\" merits the distinction of the most racist song title in America. Released in March, 1916, by Columbia Records it was written by actor Harry C. Browne and played on the familiar depiction of black people as mindless beasts of burden greedily devouring slices of watermelon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I came across this gem while researching racial stereotypes. I was a bit conflicted on whether the song warranted a listen. Admittedly though, beneath my righteous indignation, I was rather curious how century-old, overt racism sounded and slightly amused by the farcical title. When I started the song, the music that tumbled from the speakers was that of the ever-recognizable jingle of the \u003ca href=\"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZB6WXDuM1g\">ice cream truck\u003c/a> (For the record, not all ice cream trucks play this same song, but a great many of them do.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As quickly as it began, the music paused, and this call-and-response ensued:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\n\u003cp>Browne: \"You n******s quit throwin' them bones and come down and get your ice cream!\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Black men (incredulously): \"Ice Cream?!?\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Browne: \"Yes, ice cream! Colored man's ice cream: WATERMELON!!\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>My mouth dropped. The music immediately resumed and so did the racism. I soon realized that the ice cream truck song was forever ruined for me, especially once the chorus began:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>N***** love a watermelon ha ha, ha ha!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>N***** love a watermelon ha ha, ha ha!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For here, they're made with a half a pound of co'l\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There's nothing like a watermelon for a hungry coon\u003c/p>\n\u003c/blockquote>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/Ebh6x6Bze_0'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/Ebh6x6Bze_0'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Origin of the song\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I wondered how such a prejudiced song could have become the anthem of ice cream and childhood summers. I learned that though Mr. Browne was fairly creative in his lyrics, the song's premise and its melody are nearly as old as America itself. As often happens with matters of race, something that is rather \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/blogs/codeswitch/2014/03/23/291525991/when-vanilla-was-brown-and-how-we-came-to-see-it-as-white\">vanilla\u003c/a> in origin is coopted and sprinkled with malice along the way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For his creation, Browne simply used the well-known melody of the early nineteenth-century song \"\u003ca href=\"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VsnZxfkkoKQ\">Turkey in the Straw\u003c/a>,\" which dates back to the even older and traditional British song \"\u003ca href=\"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etQ7knwsglU\">The (Old) Rose Tree\u003c/a>.\" The tune was brought to America's colonies by Scots-Irish immigrants who settled along the Appalachian Trail and added lyrics that mirrored their new lifestyle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The first and natural inclination, of course, is to assume that the ice cream truck song is simply paying homage to \"Turkey in the Straw,\" but the melody reached the nation only after it was appropriated by traveling blackface minstrel shows. There is simply no divorcing the song from the dozens of decades it was almost exclusively used for coming up with new ways to ridicule, and profit from, black people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Blackface minstrels steal the show\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the late 1820s, the music was given new lyrics that dripped with racism and titled \"\u003ca href=\"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0i9XMyTw-o\">Zip Coon\u003c/a>.\" The blackface character of the same name parodied a free black man attempting to conform to white high society by dressing in fine clothes and using big words. Fifty years later in antebellum America, the character became an archetype of the black urbanite and propelled minstrel shows to the height of their popularity. Zip Coon was the city slicker counterpart to the dimwitted, rural blackface character whose name became infamous in 20th century America — Jim Crow. These two characters would often interact on stage and were the inspiration for the hugely successful Amos 'n' Andy act decades later.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The lyrics of \"Zip Coon\" follow the namesake through encounters with possums, playing the banjo, and courting a woman whose skin was so black that he calls her \"ol Suky blue skin.\" A century later, it was still celebrated and inspiring America's music. The recognizable melody aside, we've all sung a variation of the lyrics. The chorus goes:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\n\u003cp>O zip a duden duden duden zip a duden day.\u003c/p>\n\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>(If this sounds similar to the Academy Award winning \"\u003ca href=\"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LcxYwwIL5zQ\">Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah\u003c/a>,\" it's because that song was derived from this chorus)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the turn of the twentieth century, one of the nation's \u003ca href=\"http://www.ferris.edu/htmls/news/jimcrow/index.htm\">most popular collectibles was the coon card\u003c/a> — a postcard with racist artwork, such as bug-eyed, clown-faced blacks eating watermelon. These items were essentially the racist version of trading cards and nearly ubiquitous. Browne meshed the theme of the popular coon cards with the familiar melody and voila: \"N***** Love a Watermelon Ha! Ha! Ha!\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The ice cream cross-over happened concurrently. Nineteenth-century ice cream parlors played the popular minstrel songs of the day. After World War II, the advent of the automobile and the ensuing sprawl required parlors to devise a way to take their products to the customers. The ice cream truck was the solution and a music box was installed in them as a way to announce their presence in neighborhoods. Naturally, the traditional minstrel tunes of the previous century were employed to evoke the memorable parlor experience.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And this is the story of why our beloved ice cream truck plays blackface minstrel music that sends kids dashing into homes in a Pavlovian frenzy searching for money to buy a popsicle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Race, ice cream and America\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here in the nation's capital, the cherry blossoms have come and gone. This means the warm weather will soon bring out the ice cream trucks, and I'll be confronted once again by its inconvenient truth. It's not new knowledge that matters of race permeate the depths of our history and infiltrate the most innocent of experiences, even the simple pleasure of ice cream (Who can forget Eddie Murphy's famous, NSFW routine about \u003ca href=\"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vg-csjbwo5s\">the poor, black experience with ice cream trucks\u003c/a>?). However, when the reach of racism robs me of fond memories from my childhood, it feels intensely personal again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Whenever I hear the music now, the antique voice laughing about n******s and watermelon fills my head. I can live with this, but what's to be done on the summer day when my children's eyes light up at the far-off sound of the familiar melody, and they dash in a frenzy towards me for change? Do I empower them with the history of our country or encourage the youthful exuberance induced by the ice cream truck? Is it my responsibility to foul the sweet taste of ice cream with their first taste of racism?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The answer is intellectually complex, but parental intuition provides clarity. When teeth fall out, I blame the dollar under their pillow on the tooth fairy. When presents appear overnight under the fir tree, I say Santa Claus is the culprit. And so when a song about n******s and watermelon fills the suburban air, I will smile and hand over money from my pocket. The sight of my children enjoying a Good Humor ice cream bar will fight back the racist song that lampooned black people who happened to be in good humor. The delivery of the cold hard truth can wait until another day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Recall+That+Ice+Cream+Truck+Song%3F+We+Have+Unpleasant+News+For+You&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDA1OTI3MjQ5MDEyODUwMTE2MzM1YzNmZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>You probably haven’t been waiting around for some singer-songwriter to update Harry Chapin’s inescapable 1974 hit “Cat’s In the Cradle,” the slightly cloying tune about the changing dynamic between parents and children over time. And if you did happen to be waiting for such a song, you probably wouldn’t put \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15998977/conor-oberst\">Conor Oberst\u003c/a>, noted sensitive indie-rock soul, in charge of writing it. Let’s face it: Even if you’re an obsessive Oberst fan — a follower of \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15189641/bright-eyes\">Bright Eyes\u003c/a>, Desaparecidos and assorted other projects — this wouldn’t likely rank high on the list of Songs You Wish Conor Oberst Would Write.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Which is one surprise, among many, in “You Are Your Mother’s Child,” from Oberst’s artful and beautifully realized \u003cem>Upside Down Mountain\u003c/em>. Here we have a tired, heartstring-tugging trope from the 1970s resurrected as something lucid and disarmingly poignant. Something that can sneak right inside the most cynical heart and melt the layers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Singing in the wavering, edge-of-emotion tone that is his trademark, Oberst follows the stages of a young life (“Halloween costume, lookin’ real cute”) with the fond, measured regard of the cool parent. He knows how to be sentimental — some of the most gorgeous music on \u003cem>Upside Down Mountain\u003c/em> comes from the perspective of love’s stinging aftermath — but here he attempts restraint, slipping details into the verses the way a documentary filmmaker would. He’s all sly and “aw-shucks” in the lyric writing, trusting that the subject matter, and the deft transitions from specific moments to general observations (“fear, that’s a big emotion”), will bring the narrative home. It does.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a small song, in the scheme of things, but it illustrates a large idea about Oberst as a songwriter: He knows how to work a conceit. Starting from what can seem like a slight kernel of an idea, he draws his listeners patiently into each of his narrative worlds, one curiosity-activating line at a time. The album’s opening couplet, delivered over a single fervently strummed acoustic guitar chord, is typical: “Polished my shoes, I bought a brand new hat, moved to a town that time forgot / where I don’t have to shave or be approachable / No, I can do just what I want.” Fairly stock life-in-transition stuff, right? So what does this wandering soul want? The next line: “I want to walk in a howling wind ’til it scatters all my thoughts…” Just like that, we’ve gone from an ordinary country-rock rambler scene into something more multidimensional and novelistic. Who longs to be out in a howling wind?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Upside Down Mountain\u003c/em> suggests that Oberst is growing, rapidly, as a craftsman. It’s the first truly intimate set of songs he’s offered in a while — really since his 2008 eponymous gem, though contemplative moments seeped into 2009’s \u003cem>Outer South\u003c/em>, which he recorded with the Mystic Valley Band. Oberst visits some of the rowdy backbeats of those previous works, but even in the driving rock tracks (the \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15050998/neil-young\">Neil Young\u003c/a>-ish “Zigzagging Toward the Light”), he’s brokering interior thoughts, choosing clusters of words for the ways they thrive, or sometimes disappear, inside the sonic swirl.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With help from several producers, including \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/templates/search/index.php?searchinput=jonathan+wilson\">Jonathan Wilson\u003c/a>, Oberst seeks out vivid and frequently counter-intuitive contrasts between the messages of the songs and the surrounding instrumental atmospheres. One example: On the surface, the riffing horns and striding beats of “Hundreds of Ways” radiate a kind of parade-day joviality. Get inside the song, though, and you realize Oberst is talking about what it means to contend with dark, possibly unwelcome memories when everyone else seems to be sashaying through life. The very next track, “Artifact #1,” delves further into the muddy pools and quagmires of memory, examining what it means to hold onto the last glimmer of a great and vanished love. It’s a stunning one-two punch, one of those rare album moments where two works grow more profound as a result of their proximity to each other.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Oberst has been at this songwriting thing for a while. He’s shown an uncommon knack for observation and, at times, a willingness to funnel those observations into sturdy if perfectly ordinary vessels — songs that teeter toward the generic. What’s impressive about \u003cem>Upside Down Mountain\u003c/em> is how effortless it feels. He doesn’t work overtime trying to reinvent the wheel, doesn’t get twisted up in the veteran songwriter’s pursuit of a stunning new insight. Instead, he picks a road and follows where it leads, asking all the responsible questions, referring back to haunting asides and bitter refrains from other songs, and looking everywhere for clues about the restlessness that follows him like a stormcloud. He’s not looking for a cure, mind you. Just clues. \u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=First+Listen%3A+Conor+Oberst%2C+%27Upside+Down+Mountain%27&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>You probably haven’t been waiting around for some singer-songwriter to update Harry Chapin’s inescapable 1974 hit “Cat’s In the Cradle,” the slightly cloying tune about the changing dynamic between parents and children over time. And if you did happen to be waiting for such a song, you probably wouldn’t put \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15998977/conor-oberst\">Conor Oberst\u003c/a>, noted sensitive indie-rock soul, in charge of writing it. Let’s face it: Even if you’re an obsessive Oberst fan — a follower of \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15189641/bright-eyes\">Bright Eyes\u003c/a>, Desaparecidos and assorted other projects — this wouldn’t likely rank high on the list of Songs You Wish Conor Oberst Would Write.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Which is one surprise, among many, in “You Are Your Mother’s Child,” from Oberst’s artful and beautifully realized \u003cem>Upside Down Mountain\u003c/em>. Here we have a tired, heartstring-tugging trope from the 1970s resurrected as something lucid and disarmingly poignant. Something that can sneak right inside the most cynical heart and melt the layers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Singing in the wavering, edge-of-emotion tone that is his trademark, Oberst follows the stages of a young life (“Halloween costume, lookin’ real cute”) with the fond, measured regard of the cool parent. He knows how to be sentimental — some of the most gorgeous music on \u003cem>Upside Down Mountain\u003c/em> comes from the perspective of love’s stinging aftermath — but here he attempts restraint, slipping details into the verses the way a documentary filmmaker would. He’s all sly and “aw-shucks” in the lyric writing, trusting that the subject matter, and the deft transitions from specific moments to general observations (“fear, that’s a big emotion”), will bring the narrative home. It does.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a small song, in the scheme of things, but it illustrates a large idea about Oberst as a songwriter: He knows how to work a conceit. Starting from what can seem like a slight kernel of an idea, he draws his listeners patiently into each of his narrative worlds, one curiosity-activating line at a time. The album’s opening couplet, delivered over a single fervently strummed acoustic guitar chord, is typical: “Polished my shoes, I bought a brand new hat, moved to a town that time forgot / where I don’t have to shave or be approachable / No, I can do just what I want.” Fairly stock life-in-transition stuff, right? So what does this wandering soul want? The next line: “I want to walk in a howling wind ’til it scatters all my thoughts…” Just like that, we’ve gone from an ordinary country-rock rambler scene into something more multidimensional and novelistic. Who longs to be out in a howling wind?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Upside Down Mountain\u003c/em> suggests that Oberst is growing, rapidly, as a craftsman. It’s the first truly intimate set of songs he’s offered in a while — really since his 2008 eponymous gem, though contemplative moments seeped into 2009’s \u003cem>Outer South\u003c/em>, which he recorded with the Mystic Valley Band. Oberst visits some of the rowdy backbeats of those previous works, but even in the driving rock tracks (the \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/artists/15050998/neil-young\">Neil Young\u003c/a>-ish “Zigzagging Toward the Light”), he’s brokering interior thoughts, choosing clusters of words for the ways they thrive, or sometimes disappear, inside the sonic swirl.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With help from several producers, including \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/templates/search/index.php?searchinput=jonathan+wilson\">Jonathan Wilson\u003c/a>, Oberst seeks out vivid and frequently counter-intuitive contrasts between the messages of the songs and the surrounding instrumental atmospheres. One example: On the surface, the riffing horns and striding beats of “Hundreds of Ways” radiate a kind of parade-day joviality. Get inside the song, though, and you realize Oberst is talking about what it means to contend with dark, possibly unwelcome memories when everyone else seems to be sashaying through life. The very next track, “Artifact #1,” delves further into the muddy pools and quagmires of memory, examining what it means to hold onto the last glimmer of a great and vanished love. It’s a stunning one-two punch, one of those rare album moments where two works grow more profound as a result of their proximity to each other.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Oberst has been at this songwriting thing for a while. He’s shown an uncommon knack for observation and, at times, a willingness to funnel those observations into sturdy if perfectly ordinary vessels — songs that teeter toward the generic. What’s impressive about \u003cem>Upside Down Mountain\u003c/em> is how effortless it feels. He doesn’t work overtime trying to reinvent the wheel, doesn’t get twisted up in the veteran songwriter’s pursuit of a stunning new insight. Instead, he picks a road and follows where it leads, asking all the responsible questions, referring back to haunting asides and bitter refrains from other songs, and looking everywhere for clues about the restlessness that follows him like a stormcloud. He’s not looking for a cure, mind you. Just clues. \u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=First+Listen%3A+Conor+Oberst%2C+%27Upside+Down+Mountain%27&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>Makers of R-rated comedies face an essential dilemma: finding brand new ways to gross out their snickering adolescent viewers. But as \u003cem>Neighbors \u003c/em>demonstrates, there’s another challenge that’s just as tricky: piloting the raunchy scenario to a payoff that upholds the very middle-class values the movie gleefully profanes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Neighbors\u003c/em> opens in an upscale suburban Anywhereville, where a house is occupied by a standard sitcom couple: goofy, pudgy dad and improbably beautiful mom. Although they have a infant daughter, Mac (Seth Rogan) and Kelly (Rose Byrne) endeavor to keep their pre-parental cool. They’re pot-smokers and rave-goers, and when the movie begins they’re trying to have sex. They fail, embarrassed that baby Stella can see them, although Mac’s insistence on narrating the action — “this is happening!” — is just as deflating.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The real conflict begins when a college fraternity, Delta Psi Beta, moves in next door, cramming its new home with beer, babes, noise and hallucinogenic mushrooms. Mac and Kelly try to indulge the newcomers, even joining them for some of their daily parties. But the neighborly outreach doesn’t lead to quiet, and Stella can’t sleep through the racket. So the 30-something old folks call the — useless, of course — cops.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Full-scale culture war results, led by grim-eyed, often shirtless Delta president Teddy (Zac Efron) and his marginally more reasonable lieutenant, Pete (Dave Franco). Foul-mouthed Kelly is a more skilled combatant than Mac, even if she does sometimes divert her hostility away from Teddy and toward her husband. The bitter conflict encompasses condoms, exploding airbags, girl-on-girl smooches and a swordfight that uses plaster-casts of the frat boys’ penises.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Phony phalluses also featured in \u003cem>Neighbors\u003c/em> director Nicholas Stoller’s 2010 farce, \u003cem>Get Him to the Greek\u003c/em>. In that flick, the chubby hero was played by Jonah Hill, and his path to suburban domesticity was temporarily barred by an aggressive rock-groupie type with a dildo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Been there, inserted that, so Stoller and scripters Andrew J. Cohen and Brendan O’Brien need a new outrage. They find it in the procreative aspect of sex, which may discomfit the teen-boy demographic even more than anal rape. After some hard partying, Kelly is swollen with alcohol-tainted milk, and hysterically insists that Mac relieve the pressure. A set of veiny prosthetic breasts amplifies the body-horror hilarity of the moment, which may be unprecedented but feels as predictable as everything else in this utterly routine provocation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After that scene, it hardly matters if the frat house burns down and takes whole neighborhood with it. \u003cem>Neighbors\u003c/em> has attained its peak of queasy vulgarity, and now must negotiate its way down the other side toward a cozily sentimental conclusion.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The movie finds that outcome in the fundamental kinship of Teddy and Mac. As both men stand topless outside an Abercrombie & Fitch, the sculpted frat boy begins to realize that he will someday be a flabby suburban dad. He, too, will have a wife, a child and a mortgage. His only connection to his glory days may very well be the large-screen TV on which he watches future R-rated comedy patsies be taunted, pummeled and mortified. \u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=%27Neighbors%27+Just+Wants+To+Be+The+Gross+Joke+Next+Door&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Makers of R-rated comedies face an essential dilemma: finding brand new ways to gross out their snickering adolescent viewers. But as \u003cem>Neighbors \u003c/em>demonstrates, there’s another challenge that’s just as tricky: piloting the raunchy scenario to a payoff that upholds the very middle-class values the movie gleefully profanes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Neighbors\u003c/em> opens in an upscale suburban Anywhereville, where a house is occupied by a standard sitcom couple: goofy, pudgy dad and improbably beautiful mom. Although they have a infant daughter, Mac (Seth Rogan) and Kelly (Rose Byrne) endeavor to keep their pre-parental cool. They’re pot-smokers and rave-goers, and when the movie begins they’re trying to have sex. They fail, embarrassed that baby Stella can see them, although Mac’s insistence on narrating the action — “this is happening!” — is just as deflating.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The real conflict begins when a college fraternity, Delta Psi Beta, moves in next door, cramming its new home with beer, babes, noise and hallucinogenic mushrooms. Mac and Kelly try to indulge the newcomers, even joining them for some of their daily parties. But the neighborly outreach doesn’t lead to quiet, and Stella can’t sleep through the racket. So the 30-something old folks call the — useless, of course — cops.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Full-scale culture war results, led by grim-eyed, often shirtless Delta president Teddy (Zac Efron) and his marginally more reasonable lieutenant, Pete (Dave Franco). Foul-mouthed Kelly is a more skilled combatant than Mac, even if she does sometimes divert her hostility away from Teddy and toward her husband. The bitter conflict encompasses condoms, exploding airbags, girl-on-girl smooches and a swordfight that uses plaster-casts of the frat boys’ penises.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Phony phalluses also featured in \u003cem>Neighbors\u003c/em> director Nicholas Stoller’s 2010 farce, \u003cem>Get Him to the Greek\u003c/em>. In that flick, the chubby hero was played by Jonah Hill, and his path to suburban domesticity was temporarily barred by an aggressive rock-groupie type with a dildo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Been there, inserted that, so Stoller and scripters Andrew J. Cohen and Brendan O’Brien need a new outrage. They find it in the procreative aspect of sex, which may discomfit the teen-boy demographic even more than anal rape. After some hard partying, Kelly is swollen with alcohol-tainted milk, and hysterically insists that Mac relieve the pressure. A set of veiny prosthetic breasts amplifies the body-horror hilarity of the moment, which may be unprecedented but feels as predictable as everything else in this utterly routine provocation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After that scene, it hardly matters if the frat house burns down and takes whole neighborhood with it. \u003cem>Neighbors\u003c/em> has attained its peak of queasy vulgarity, and now must negotiate its way down the other side toward a cozily sentimental conclusion.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The movie finds that outcome in the fundamental kinship of Teddy and Mac. As both men stand topless outside an Abercrombie & Fitch, the sculpted frat boy begins to realize that he will someday be a flabby suburban dad. He, too, will have a wife, a child and a mortgage. His only connection to his glory days may very well be the large-screen TV on which he watches future R-rated comedy patsies be taunted, pummeled and mortified. \u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=%27Neighbors%27+Just+Wants+To+Be+The+Gross+Joke+Next+Door&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>“What’s going through your mind when you’re doing that… or do you not think at all?” Those words, familiar to any teenager and parent, get yelled at Teddy (Jack Kilmer) about halfway through \u003cem>Palo Alto\u003c/em>. Teddy, still in high school, is on probation after his second arrest, his final chance to get his act together before facing time in a juvenile detention center. The line, though, could have been directed at nearly any of the teenagers in Gia Coppola’s thoughtful debut feature, which offers an empathetic account of teenage tribulations but also makes a good case for why the phrase “troubled youth” is needlessly tautological.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Coppola, who here extends her family’s predilection for producing talented directors one generation further, seems to have taken most from her Aunt Sofia’s films. \u003cem>Palo Alto\u003c/em> shares the soft visual tones of \u003cem>Somewhere \u003c/em>and \u003cem>Lost in Translation\u003c/em>, their patient pacing, and their tendency to linger on mundane moments that, in accumulation, offer a comfortable intimacy. When Coppola rests her camera on Teddy sullenly playing his guitar, or on the timid April (Emma Roberts) giving herself pep talks in front of the mirror in her room, there’s no overt purpose to the shots, just a steady portrayal of the inchoate emotions of youth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Coppola captures her characters only halfway to adulthood: they drink too much, experiment sexually, and put on an air of maturity, but their bedrooms are still filled with elementary school photos and childhood decorations. Their reckless actions can reflect an abundance of confidence—they drive drunk and cut down trees in cemeteries—but, just as often, they only highlight a persistent immaturity, such as when Fred (Nat Wolff), Teddy’s best friend, draws sexual pictures in a children’s book at the library.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTqMUu1iTIo\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Palo Alto\u003c/em>, which is based on a collection of short stories by James Franco, displays a refreshing lack of handwringing over these acts.Coppola knows there’s a difference between acting out and behaving immorally, just as there’s a difference between the absent but loving parents who populate the movie and adults like Mr. B (James Franco), April’s teacher, who flirts and sleeps with his students.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The greatest respect the film shows its young characters is giving them the benefit of the doubt—the acknowledgement that bad behavior doesn’t necessarily make them bad people. But Coppola also knows better than to let them off the hook completely. At one key moment, we learn that one character may have committed a horrible crime. And while Coppola leaves open the possibility that it was just an awful thought, thankfully never acted upon, the suggestion that the line between youthful debauchery and immorality may not be so far off haunts the film.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That said, \u003cem>Palo Alto\u003c/em>‘s portrayals of the tender innocence of youth are ultimately better realized than its darker moments, which quickly become too angst-ridden, as if Coppola feels the need to overemphasize the inner turmoil of her characters. Freddy in particular remains unfortunately one-dimensional in his displays of exaggerated manic behavior. The other characters’ actions reveal a fraught internal thought process, but Freddy’s only suggest an out of control id.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That unfettered energy, of course, is part of being a teenager too, as are the parties, the drinking, and the sexual exploration, all of which take up a large part of \u003cem>Palo Alto\u003c/em>. But the movie’s happiest moments tellingly come when the characters are among younger kids, away from the pressures to act beyond their age. As a coming-of-age story, \u003cem>Palo Alto \u003c/em>doesn’t take the loss of innocence lightly; on the contrary, it’s a film about the desperate need to keep some of it intact.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>Palo Alto\u003c/i> opens in Bay Area theaters on May 16.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=To+Be+Young%2C+Foolish+And+Baffled%3A+Coming+Of+Age+In+%27Palo+Alto%27&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\" alt=\"\">\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"tagline": "Exploring the Bay Area, one question at a time",
"info": "KQED’s new podcast, Bay Curious, gets to the bottom of the mysteries — both profound and peculiar — that give the Bay Area its unique identity. And we’ll do it with your help! You ask the questions. You decide what Bay Curious investigates. And you join us on the journey to find the answers.",
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},
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"info": "KQED’s statewide radio news program providing daily coverage of issues, trends and public policy decisions.",
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"order": 8
},
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"airtime": "SUN 1pm-2pm, TUE 10pm, WED 1am",
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"source": "City Arts & Lectures"
},
"link": "https://www.cityarts.net",
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"order": 1
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"info": "\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em>, which listeners will hear in the first part of the hour, has fearless and much-needed conversations about race. Hosted by journalists of color, the show tackles the subject of race head-on, exploring how it impacts every part of society — from politics and pop culture to history, sports and more.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em>, which will be in the second part of the hour, guides you through spaces and feelings no one prepares you for — from finances to mental health, from workplace microaggressions to imposter syndrome, from relationships to parenting. The show features experts with real world experience and shares their knowledge. Because everyone needs a little help being human.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510312/codeswitch\">\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/lifekit\">\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />",
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"id": "commonwealth-club",
"title": "Commonwealth Club of California Podcast",
"info": "The Commonwealth Club of California is the nation's oldest and largest public affairs forum. As a non-partisan forum, The Club brings to the public airwaves diverse viewpoints on important topics. The Club's weekly radio broadcast - the oldest in the U.S., dating back to 1924 - is carried across the nation on public radio stations and is now podcasting. Our website archive features audio of our recent programs, as well as selected speeches from our long and distinguished history. This podcast feed is usually updated twice a week and is always un-edited.",
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"source": "Commonwealth Club of California"
},
"link": "/radio/program/commonwealth-club",
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"info": "KQED’s live call-in program discussing local, state, national and international issues, as well as in-depth interviews.",
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"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Forum-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
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"order": 9
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"info": "A live production of NPR and WBUR Boston, in collaboration with stations across the country, Here & Now reflects the fluid world of news as it's happening in the middle of the day, with timely, in-depth news, interviews and conversation. Hosted by Robin Young, Jeremy Hobson and Tonya Mosley.",
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"hidden-brain": {
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"info": "Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships.",
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"airtime": "SUN 7pm-8pm",
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"source": "NPR"
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"how-i-built-this": {
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"info": "Guy Raz dives into the stories behind some of the world's best known companies. How I Built This weaves a narrative journey about innovators, entrepreneurs and idealists—and the movements they built.",
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"airtime": "SUN 7:30pm-8pm",
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"hyphenacion": {
"id": "hyphenacion",
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"tagline": "Where conversation and cultura meet",
"info": "What kind of no sabo word is Hyphenación? For us, it’s about living within a hyphenation. Like being a third-gen Mexican-American from the Texas border now living that Bay Area Chicano life. Like Xorje! Each week we bring together a couple of hyphenated Latinos to talk all about personal life choices: family, careers, relationships, belonging … everything is on the table. ",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Hyphenacion_FinalAssets_PodcastTile.png",
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},
"jerrybrown": {
"id": "jerrybrown",
"title": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown",
"tagline": "Lessons from a lifetime in politics",
"info": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown brings listeners the wisdom of the former Governor, Mayor, and presidential candidate. Scott Shafer interviewed Brown for more than 40 hours, covering the former governor's life and half-century in the political game – and Brown has some lessons he'd like to share. ",
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"order": 18
},
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},
"latino-usa": {
"id": "latino-usa",
"title": "Latino USA",
"airtime": "MON 1am-2am, SUN 6pm-7pm",
"info": "Latino USA, the radio journal of news and culture, is the only national, English-language radio program produced from a Latino perspective.",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/latinoUsa.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "http://latinousa.org/",
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},
"link": "/radio/program/latino-usa",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?s=143441&mt=2&id=79681317&at=11l79Y&ct=nprdirectory",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510016/podcast.xml"
}
},
"marketplace": {
"id": "marketplace",
"title": "Marketplace",
"info": "Our flagship program, helmed by Kai Ryssdal, examines what the day in money delivered, through stories, conversations, newsworthy numbers and more. Updated Monday through Friday at about 3:30 p.m. PT.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 4pm-4:30pm, MON-WED 6:30pm-7pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Marketplace-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.marketplace.org/",
"meta": {
"site": "news",
"source": "American Public Media"
},
"link": "/radio/program/marketplace",
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"rss": "https://feeds.publicradio.org/public_feeds/marketplace-pm/rss/rss"
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},
"masters-of-scale": {
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"title": "Masters of Scale",
"info": "Masters of Scale is an original podcast in which LinkedIn co-founder and Greylock Partner Reid Hoffman sets out to describe and prove theories that explain how great entrepreneurs take their companies from zero to a gazillion in ingenious fashion.",
"airtime": "Every other Wednesday June 12 through October 16 at 8pm (repeats Thursdays at 2am)",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "https://mastersofscale.com/",
"meta": {
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"source": "WaitWhat"
},
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"rss": "https://rss.art19.com/masters-of-scale"
}
},
"mindshift": {
"id": "mindshift",
"title": "MindShift",
"tagline": "A podcast about the future of learning and how we raise our kids",
"info": "The MindShift podcast explores the innovations in education that are shaping how kids learn. Hosts Ki Sung and Katrina Schwartz introduce listeners to educators, researchers, parents and students who are developing effective ways to improve how kids learn. We cover topics like how fed-up administrators are developing surprising tactics to deal with classroom disruptions; how listening to podcasts are helping kids develop reading skills; the consequences of overparenting; and why interdisciplinary learning can engage students on all ends of the traditional achievement spectrum. This podcast is part of the MindShift education site, a division of KQED News. KQED is an NPR/PBS member station based in San Francisco. You can also visit the MindShift website for episodes and supplemental blog posts or tweet us \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MindShiftKQED\">@MindShiftKQED\u003c/a> or visit us at \u003ca href=\"/mindshift\">MindShift.KQED.org\u003c/a>",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Mindshift-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED MindShift: How We Will Learn",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/mindshift/",
"meta": {
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 12
},
"link": "/podcasts/mindshift",
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM1NzY0NjAwNDI5",
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"stitcher": "https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/kqed/stories-teachers-share",
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}
},
"morning-edition": {
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