Dreams matter, so I investigated one of mine — Note: I originally posted “A Vision of the World Serpent” to Medium on April 2, 2020. It was a personal piece for me and one I’ve continued to think about in the years since. This version is annotated via footnotes expanding some of the lines of thought. There are also…

What is Swedish melodic death metal if not awesome? — Note: The Thing About is a new series of short, simple heavy metal reviews that I’m starting. Scroll down to the headings that interest you or read the whole thing. I am no longer part of the Medium Partner Program, so I don’t stand to make any money off my…

Five women, one mosh pit apocalypse — When I listen to thrash metal, I often get the feeling it carries the essence of metal, as if Slayer’s Reign in Blood was the fulfillment of the genre’s being against which everything else will be a notch off. That isn’t to say, however, that metal has been devoid of…

All it takes is 20-plus pages — When I was a kid, I got most of my comic books at supermarkets and drug stores. Each month, they would stock a small assortment of key issues, and if you were lucky, you’d find the next one in a series you were following. It sounds horrible, but many of…

Ozzy Osbourne gets the Nineties tribute treatment — The Nineties were a good time for tribute albums. Candlebox covering John Lennon, Sonic Youth covering The Carpenters, Blind Melon covering Led Zeppelin… Grunge and other alternative styles were perfect for taking classic tracks, tapping into what was real about them, and presenting that in a new light. …

‘Fight Test’ is a cultural tide pool of the unexpected: pink robots, plagiarism and…Kylie Minogue? — After earning beaux psych-rock cred with The Soft Bulletin in 1999, The Flaming Lips returned in 2002 to claim stardom with Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots. The band released each of the album’s four singles on CD with B-sides, remixes, cover tunes and more of the weird illustrations for the…

The Wreckers wanted to do more than ‘Stand Still, Look Pretty’ In the first years of the new millennium, everyone knew Michelle Branch. “Everywhere” and “All You Wanted” off The Spirit Room were inescapable pop-rock hits in 2001, and the Latin rock tune “The Game of Love” with Santana was…

Anywhere I Lay My Head arrived on the eve of superstardom “You used to be much more…muchier. You’ve lost your muchness.” — from the film Alice in Wonderland (2010) The album Anywhere I Lay My Head is the result of a fuzzy concept that definitely should work: vocals by Scarlett…

A French glamor model does English poetry right — An Italian-French fashion model turned folk singer decides to write her own music to English canonical poetry on her way to becoming France’s first lady. This is the kind of thing I will check out for the sheer oddness of it, certain of getting something interesting even if unlistenable. …