A knowledgeable, earnest, always persuasive testament to a cultural touchstone.
A study of Radiohead’s 2000 classic album and how two decades have validated its dystopian vision.
Uproxx cultural critic Hyden, author of Your Favorite Band Is Killing Me, among other music books, believes that Kid A, the British band’s fourth album, is a masterpiece. For music fans today, that’s an unprovocative, almost banal assertion. But as he notes in detail, the album received mostly middling and hostile reviews at the time, with the notable exception of Pitchfork, a then-little-known tastemaker that awarded the album its highest grade of 10.0. Like all innovative works of art, Kid A baffled many at first. Radiohead’s blend of proggy structures and glitchy electronics was new; the obsessive internet music culture that leaked the album early was new; singer Thom Yorke’s cynicism about our tech-sodden existence was new. And all of it was “weirdly prescient,” a “tone poem about our ‘doomed-to-be-extremely-online’ lives,” as Hyden puts it. His book is partly standard-issue band history, covering Radiohead’s path from “Creep,” the early megahit that threatened to make them one-hit wonders, to their present-day efforts to maintain their perch as innovators. But Hyden also argues that the album captured the zeitgeist both then and now. The author finds a Kid A sensibility in contemporary movies like Vanilla Sky and Fight Club as well as in the twitchy discomfort delivered by our social media addictions. Today, Radiohead’s push-me-pull-you relationship with the traditional record industry is the norm. Though Hyden extrapolates too much cultural import from one album—Kid A wasn’t alone in railing against “soul-destroying remnants of omnipresent corporate culture,” after all—he is an intelligent and often amusing guide to its creation. The original reporting is slim, but the author writes like the best kind of music fan: informed and inviting. One of Kirkus and Rolling Stone’s Best Music Books of 2020.
A knowledgeable, earnest, always persuasive testament to a cultural touchstone.Pub Date: Sept. 29, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-306-84568-0
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Hachette
Review Posted Online: Oct. 4, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2020
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A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.
A former New York City dancer reflects on her zesty heyday in the 1970s.
Discovered on a Manhattan street in 2020 and introduced on Stanton’s Humans of New York Instagram page, Johnson, then 76, shares her dynamic history as a “fiercely independent” Black burlesque dancer who used the stage name Tanqueray and became a celebrated fixture in midtown adult theaters. “I was the only black girl making white girl money,” she boasts, telling a vibrant story about sex and struggle in a bygone era. Frank and unapologetic, Johnson vividly captures aspects of her former life as a stage seductress shimmying to blues tracks during 18-minute sets or sewing lingerie for plus-sized dancers. Though her work was far from the Broadway shows she dreamed about, it eventually became all about the nightly hustle to simply survive. Her anecdotes are humorous, heartfelt, and supremely captivating, recounted with the passion of a true survivor and the acerbic wit of a weathered, street-wise New Yorker. She shares stories of growing up in an abusive household in Albany in the 1940s, a teenage pregnancy, and prison time for robbery as nonchalantly as she recalls selling rhinestone G-strings to prostitutes to make them sparkle in the headlights of passing cars. Complemented by an array of revealing personal photographs, the narrative alternates between heartfelt nostalgia about the seedier side of Manhattan’s go-go scene and funny quips about her unconventional stage performances. Encounters with a variety of hardworking dancers, drag queens, and pimps, plus an account of the complexities of a first love with a drug-addled hustler, fill out the memoir with personality and candor. With a narrative assist from Stanton, the result is a consistently titillating and often moving story of human struggle as well as an insider glimpse into the days when Times Square was considered the Big Apple’s gloriously unpolished underbelly. The book also includes Yee’s lush watercolor illustrations.
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.Pub Date: July 12, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-27827-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2022
An engrossing and ominous chronicle, told by a master of the form.
Documenting perilous times.
In his most recent behind-the-scenes account of political power and how it is wielded, Woodward synthesizes several narrative strands, from the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection and Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel to the 2024 presidential campaign. Woodward’s clear, gripping storytelling benefits from his legendary access to prominent figures and a structure of propulsive chapters. The run-up to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is tense (if occasionally repetitive), as a cast of geopolitical insiders try to divine Vladimir Putin’s intent: “Doubt among allies, the public and among Ukrainians meant valuable time and space for Putin to maneuver.” Against this backdrop, U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham implores Donald Trump to run again, notwithstanding the former president’s denial of his 2020 defeat. This provides unwelcome distraction for President Biden, portrayed as a thoughtful, compassionate lifetime politico who could not outrace time, as demonstrated in the June 2024 debate. Throughout, Trump’s prevarications and his supporters’ cynicism provide an unsettling counterpoint to warnings provided by everyone from former Joint Chief of Staff Mark Milley to Vice President Kamala Harris, who calls a second Trump term a likely “death knell for American democracy.” The author’s ambitious scope shows him at the top of his capabilities. He concludes with these unsettling words: “Based on my reporting, Trump’s language and conduct has at times presented risks to national security—both during his presidency and afterward.”
An engrossing and ominous chronicle, told by a master of the form.Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2024
ISBN: 9781668052273
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Oct. 15, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2024
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